Fluoridation and High Infant Mortality |
Do you know that in Chile fluoridation was stopped after ten years because of Dr Schatz’s work, which linked fluoridation to high infant mortality – particularly among under-nourished children?
BFS suggested answer
At present around 5 million people in Chile drink fluoridated water, and we understand that the Chile Government intends to extend coverage to the whole population. Fluoridation in Chile was suspended in the 1970s at a time of great political unrest. It was reinstated in 1985.
BFS suggested answer refuted
Fluoridation is the greatest fraud that has ever been perpetrated, and it has been perpetrated on more people than any other fraud has.
Professor Albert Schatz, 1982
Dr Albert Schatz is probably best known for his discovery of the antibiotic streptomycin, the first antibiotic to be effective in the treatment of tuberculosis.
Between 1962 and 1965, Schatz and his family lived in Chile, where he was a professor in the Faculties of Medicine, of Chemistry and Pharmacy, of Agronomy, of Odontology and of Philosophy and Education at the University of Chile. He was also a member of the Rector’s Advisory Staff at the University of Chile and helped reorganise research and scientific teaching in that country. In addition, he was associated with projects at the Chilean Ministries of Health, Agronomy and Education; at the University of Conception and Catholic University; and with UNESCO and the Food and Agriculture Organization. In November 1965, the University of Chile awarded him an honorary degree for his contributions to that country.
Dr Schatz investigated the relationship between artificial fluoridation and increased death rates in Chile. He says he chose Chile for his research because pro-fluoridationists had never adequately studied the effect of fluoridation on poor, malnourished people as a specific group.
Using officially collected data, it soon became obvious to Schatz that fluoride was having a devastating effect. For example, Curico, which was fluoridated, had almost two and a half times as many deaths of children with congenital malformations as non-fluoridated San Fernando, and nearly three times more such deaths than the country of Chile taken as a whole.1 His research on fluoridation in Chile demonstrated that malnourished infants are the most susceptible to fluoride toxicity (see also Chapter 20).
In 1964 Schatz wrote to Dr Leland C. Hendershot, the editor of the Journal of the American Dental Association, with a view to publishing his findings. He received no reply. In the first three months of 1965, Schatz wrote three more letters to JADA, in which he discussed his evidence of the frightening consequences of fluoridation. All three letters were refused and returned to him unopened. In other words, Hendershot, on behalf of the American Dental Association, had rejected the findings of a world-renowned Nobel Prizewinning scientist out of hand without even the courtesy of opening the letters and reading them. It is one of the most blatant cases of censorship in scientific history.
Schatz says: ‘Such a response is typical of the proponents of fluoridation. The professional sanctions for opposing fluoridation can be severe, and it is best not to even acknowledge evidence of harm or ineffectiveness.’
In 1993 Schatz attested to the high levels of infant mortality in Chile after drinking water was fluoridated in that country. The following are some of the statements he made in his affidavit:2
In Chile, with widespread malnutrition and high infant mortality, it was not necessary to observe a generation of people throughout their entire lifespan in order to determine whether artificial fluoridation is or is not harmful. One could see the lethal effect of fluoridation within the first year of life in terms of increased infant mortality due to acute toxicity of fluoride.
In the US, the harmful effects of artificial fluoridation are not so clearly revealed . . . because Americans as a whole are in a considerably better state of nutrition than Chileans.
Nonetheless, artificial fluoridation of drinking water may well dwarf the thalidomide tragedy . . . Many victims of artificial fluoridation . . . die quietly during the first year of their lives, or at a later age under conditions where their deaths are attributed to some other cause.
Salvador Allende was President of Chile from his election on 4 September 1970 until his assassination by a military junta on 11 September 1973. Allende was more than a president; as a medical doctor, he was concerned about the poor people of Chile. It is well known that calcium protects against fluoride. The consumption of milk, which is the major source of calcium for infants, is especially important. On his election, Allende initiated a government programme under which free milk was delivered daily to pregnant and nursing mothers, and to children under the age of fifteen.3 At that time, Schatz says, ‘half the children in Chile under 15 years were undernourished, and 600,000 were mentally retarded through lack of protein, especially during the first months of life’. This was the health of half the children fluoridated in Chile in the 1960s. During Allende’s short presidency, birth weight of babies increased for the first time in fifty years, and, as a result of Schatz’s work, fluoridation was stopped in Chile.
Today, according to WHO figures, about 10 per cent of a Chilean population of 14.3 million again drink fluoridated water. That’s fewer than 1.5 million people – not 5 million, as claimed by the British Fluoridation Society.
Table 1 shows decayed, missing and filled teeth (DMFT) and fluoride in drinking water in various Chilean cities.4 In terms of DMFT the figures may look good, but overall the difference between the most and least fluoridated cities is less than 2.5 teeth – and look at the rates of fluorosis.
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City |
Fluoride conc. (ppm) |
DMFT |
% Fluorosis |
|
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Rancagua |
0.07 |
5.06 |
6.7 |
Santiago |
0.21 |
4.12 |
7.4 |
La Serena |
0.55 |
3.55 |
16.5 |
San Felipe |
0.93 |
3.33 |
25.3 |
Iquique |
1.10 (natural) |
2.60 |
56.8 |
|
|||
Source: WHO Oral Health Country/Area Profile Programme, Department of Noncommunicable Diseases Surveillance/Oral Health, WHO Collaborating Centre, Malmö University, Sweden.
Table 1. DMFT and fluorosis among 15-year-olds at various sites in Chile
Conclusion
Since fluoride was reintroduced into Chile in 1985, according to the WHO statistics, the trend in dental decay has increased. The average DMFT in 12-year-olds in 1989 was 6.0. In 1991 it had fallen to 5.3, but by 1995 the numbers were up to 6.7. This suggests that DMFT had been falling before fluoridation was reintroduced, but that the fall was reversed by the fluoride. These figures and the high incidence of fluorosis in Chile demonstrate that fluoridation is not improving dental health in that country – rather the reverse.
1.Schatz A. Low-level fluoridation and low-level radiation: Two case histories of misconduct in science. Schatz, Philadelphia, PA, 1996.
2.Schatz A. Affidavit in support of motion for summary judgement, Circuit Court, Fond du Lac County, Wisconsin.
3.Schatz, A. Increased death rates in Chile associated with artificial fluoridation of drinking water, with implications for other countries. J Arts Sci Humanities 1976; 2: 1–17.
4.WHO Oral Health Country/Area Profile Programme, Department of Noncommunicable Diseases Surveillance/Oral Health, WHO Collaborating Centre, Malmö University, Sweden, 1995.