Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
General health

Mumsnet doesn't verify the qualifications of users. If you have medical concerns, please consult a healthcare professional.

Original poster

Flouride in our tap water is giving us arthritis!

39 replies

francar · 10/08/2011 20:58

Recently diagnosed with inflammatory RA and a friend in America has told me about civil suits going on over there to get compo from the Government as its down to flouride poisoning. Here in the UK they put flouride into our water in order to cut down on tooth decay. This is a serious drug which some people will have a reaction to. Studies have shown it causes problems with your bones and causes arthritis. Toothpaste is a problem too, but at least with that we have a choice. As the mum of twin 2 year olds I feel very angry that our government has let this happen and feel like I have failed my children by forcing them to brush their teeth with gloops of flouride and drink 'healthy water'. Google it for details. I want to find out if there is any action against this situation so that I can join in as I haven't chosen to be drugged! Any ideas?

OP posts:
SparkyDuchess · 11/08/2011 00:10

Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease. Fluoride has absolutely no bearing on it.

JarethTheGoblinKing · 11/08/2011 00:11

Ditto

JarethTheGoblinKing · 11/08/2011 00:12

(flouride is naturally occurring in many areas to)

Thistledew · 11/08/2011 00:23

Fluoride is a naturally occurring chemical that exists in variable quantities across the world dependant upon soil composition. It is necessary for proper bone and tooth development and you can suffer from physical complaints through to much or too little consumption. In the UK it occurs naturally at very low levels. It is possible to get enough in your diet if you eat a lot of green vegetables, but most people in the UK do not eat enough to obtain sufficient fluoride, so it is added to water.

jasper · 11/08/2011 00:25

Fluoride is NOT a drug. You have not been drugged.

It's a naturally occurring element.

There is NO evidence it causes any nasty stuff so please relax and don't listen to scaremongering .

And it's the best thing you can possibly do for your children's teeth - getting them to brush with fluoridated toothpaste ( and feeding them a healthy diet of course)
I am sorry to hear about your recent diagnosis and hope you get good help to manage and treat it.

Thistledew · 11/08/2011 00:34

World Health Organisation Report No problems in the UK. Due to geographical differences, problems in America are completely meaningless here.

celadon · 11/08/2011 00:36

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

celadon · 11/08/2011 00:38

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

piprabbit · 11/08/2011 00:41

Sorry about your diagnosis - I hope you get your RA under control soon.

Have you looked at www.arthritisresearchuk.org/arthritis_information.aspx for lots of useful advice, information and facts?

Toobluntforboss · 11/08/2011 00:42

Get over it francar - sounds like you're looking to follow the US example of 'easy money' to me. Do the research.

jasper · 11/08/2011 00:43

are you a dentist, celadon?

differentnameforthis · 11/08/2011 05:32

Little fluoride is ingested by way of toothpaste, it tends to stay local. And if children are ingesting it, then they need to be supervised better to prevent this happening, as per instructions on most boxes.

This type of hysteria will put people off using fluoridated toothpaste & will cause a rise in dental decay.

differentnameforthis · 11/08/2011 05:36

The best thing you can do for your children's teeth is not give them sugar

Not true. And not possible. When you consider that lost of foods have hidden sugars in them.

The best thing you can do is LIMIT sugar, keep high sugar foods/drinks to meal times, don't let them snack on high sugar foods & brush teeth 20-30 minutes after eating. Regular dental visits. Brush their teeth until they are old enough & dexterous enough to do a good job themselves (use disclosing tabs to check how they are doing).

Teeth undergo an acid attack for approx 20 minutes after eating/drinking practically EVERYTHING. It is this that causes plaque to form & it si the bacteria in the plaque that eat through the enamel & into the dentine. This process isn't the result of eating sugar, it is the result of eating anything!

Thumbwitch · 11/08/2011 05:46

Ingested fluoride can be a problem; excessive fluoride can cause dental fluorosis etc. and yes, it has been linked with other conditions.
In toothpaste, it shouldn't be an issue as you're not supposed to swallow toothpaste, but fluoridation of the water supply is more of a concern.

Different - you are mostly right but it is primarily the sugar that feeds the bacteria, they thrive on it and produce acid from it, which is what eats through the enamel. SO the more sugar you have, the more you will feed your plaque bacteria and the more acid they will produce --> damage.
Xylitol is a sugar alcohol that the plaque bacteria cannot use, it doesn't feed them and they can't turn it into acid, which is why "contains Xylitol!" seems to be some kind of "woohoo!" factor in flogging chewing gum. Actually, apart from improving the sweetness without feeding the plaque bacteria, xylitol does nothing - the lysozyme in saliva is more active against the bacteria, and chewing the gum helps increase saliva production.

differentnameforthis · 11/08/2011 07:56

they thrive on it and produce acid from it, which is what eats through the enamel

Which is the acid attack I was referring to. And that happens after you eat anything, not just sugar.

Original poster
francar · 11/08/2011 10:22

Not looking for money - just to keep my children safe. Get your head out of the sand!

OP posts:
Original poster
francar · 11/08/2011 10:30

Sorry, I'm new to this. The last message was directed at Toobluntforboss!

OP posts:
oldenoughtowearpurple · 11/08/2011 10:35

Your water may not have added fluoride. Thames Water don't add fluoride to their water.

janinlondon · 11/08/2011 10:49

Regardless of what I might or might not think of your assertion, hardly anywhere in the UK has fluoride added. There is a map here

Thumbwitch · 11/08/2011 11:46

Over-fluoridation might be less of a problem in the UK than it is in the USA but there have been suggestions that all UK water should be fluoridated, and afaik it's still under consideration.

If you can get past your initial scepticism to this site, and read down the time line of this article on fluoride, you'll see that in the past year, the American Environmental Protection Agency have decided to prevent Dow from producing sulphuryl fluoride as a food fumigant:
"Victory! Ban on Sulfuryl Fluoride as Food Fumigant Granted

In 2010, the Objectors' attorney made several demands to the EPA to respond to the Objections, the Requests for a Hearing, and the Petition (Wallace, Apr. 2010, Aug. 2010, Nov. 2010). Just days before the Objectors were to sue for a response, the EPA finally announced that they granted all of their Objections.

According to the EPA's General Counsel for the Office of Pesticides, it was the first time in its history that it had done so.

The EPA announced on January 10, 2011, that it was proposing a phase-out ban on the use of sulfuryl fluoride. This was unprecedented and an enormous credit to the EPA's new administrator, Lisa Jackson, and to those in the Pesticides division who stood up for sound science and resisted the enormous lobbying effort by Dow.

Three days prior to this decision the Department of Health and Human Services used the fact that "41percent among adolescents aged 12-15" now have dental fluorosis as one of its reasons to propose a lowering of the fluoride level in fluoridation schemes. It's a great start, but the fight is far from over."

If you read the results of the rat tests and the science involved, you'll see that fluoride ingestion has the potential to be quite a serious problem.

JanMorrow · 11/08/2011 17:27

Just came on to say not many places in the UK have fluoride added to the water!

DBennett · 11/08/2011 18:50

I'm afraid to say that the mercola umbrella of websites is not a good source of health information.

If it was, they would have mentioned that both the NHS/Department of Health and the CDC have conducted systematic reviews of all the research evidence.

UK one available here or here (for a briefer review).

CDC behind a paywall but summaries here.

These reports agree that the evidence supports dental fluorosis as adverse effect of water fluoridation.
Nothing else comes close to being linked.

On the OPs initial issue of rheumatoid arthritis, there is some evidence here & here that patients with RA are at risk of fluoride deficiencies and supplementation improves bone density.

Thumbwitch · 12/08/2011 01:26

If you could take your blinkers off for just a moment, there, DBennett you would see that the reason I linked to that site is because the US Environmental Protection Agency have decided that a fluoride-based food fumigant leaves unsafe levels of fluoride in some of the foods that it is used on. And that the research done on animals has shown that the high fluoride levels are toxic.

But by all means throw the baby out with the bathwater if it makes you happier.

Dorje · 12/08/2011 02:48

I use a very stylish tinfoil hat for this kind of thing - it's a fascinating cloche design, with a pointy bit at the top like an antennae - I find it's faster than broadband for the 'signals'.

PS I have all my own teeth.

Funk · 12/08/2011 05:08

Dr Mercola on fluoride He's always got lots of interesting things to say