Guest guest Posted October 24, 2006 Report Share Posted October 24, 2006 How FLUORIDE Affects the THYROID JoAnn Guest Jun 09, 2004 15:42 PDT -- Fluoride: A Statement of Concern by Paul Connett, PhD --Waste Not #459 Toxins from the environs may *alter* the thyroid function. Eduardo Gaitan from Univ Mississipi found that drinking water contaminated with petrochemicals results in *blocked* " activity " of thyroid *hormones*. ( Ref Jounal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism 1983 Vol. 56) Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB's) can alter *thyroxine* levels and result in symptoms of thyroid disorders (Science, vol.267) It is now understood that the environment, diet and nutrition influence thyroid function in a number of ways and may relate to thyroid disorders of non specific origin. (Annual Review of Nutrition -1995 Vol 15) Another line of evidence indicating that fluoride is an 'endocrine disrupter' stems from the number of studies that indicate the fluoride may *inhibit* the " functioning " of the thyroid gland. To put the matter as simply as I can, this group has been able to show that areas of endemic fluorosis are also areas " designated' as being endemic with *iodine* " deficiency " disorders (IDD). Thyroid hormones are absolutely essential for normal growth and development. The thyroid gland produces the thyroid hormones, T3 and T4. These two hormones have 3 and 4 *iodine* atoms respectively. Schuld's group has also shown that there is a remarkable *similarity* between the symptoms for both underactive and overactive thyroid and those reported for " fluoride poisoning " . Putting these two conditions together, it appears that fluoride *decreases* the production of thyroid hormones. For a normal person if you are exposed to fluoride it could result in reducing thyroid hormone production below normal and necessary levels (i.e., hypothyroidism). It is not clear just how fluoride reduces thyroid hormone production. Since Fluoride, fluorine, and chlorine are **identical** to the molecular *structure* of *iodine*, the thyroid *detects* it as such. Alternatively, fluoride *inhibits* the " enzymes " inside the gland which " assemble " the hormones from its chemical precursor, the amino acid tyrosine. -- Fluoride's *toxicity* is rated higher than lead --- FLUORIDE AND BONES According to Dr. John Lee, a bone specialist from California, " Certain crucial *errors* common to fluoride studies that claim benefit have been identified and, when applied to any or all fluoridation trials claiming to prove benefit, are sufficient to nullify them. I challenge fluoridationists to find just one trial that can stand a critical review in the light of the errors I describe. If they cannot, they should use their authority to help rid our water supply of this useless toxin " . Lee continues, " It is important to understand that in health matters, everything is interrelated and multifactorial. This presents a challenge to all health research: the factor being studied is just one factor among many that may confound the study. If we turn from teeth to bones, it is shocking to see how little investigation of the long term effect of fluoride on bones has been undertaken. For example, there has been no comprehensive attempt to determine the levels of fluoride in the bones of people living in the US. This, despite the fact that we know the following: 1) fluoridation has continued for over 50 years; 2) approximately half of the fluoride we ingest each day is deposited in our bones; 3) there is a steady accumulation of fluoride in our bones over our lifetime; 4) serious bone diseases have occurred to people with excessive exposure, especially in workers in the aluminum industry and in areas of countries like India and China; and 5) we are being exposed to more sources of fluoride today than we were in the 1940s and 1950s. By now, if American health authorities had done their job properly we should have had a wealth of data. We should know the bone levels as a function of many variables: location, fluoridation, hardness of water supply, diet, disease status, smoking, etc. According to a 1993 report from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), " Fluoride is found in all bone, with the concentration depending on total fluoride exposure. The amount varies among different bones. The fluoride concentration in bone increases with age. In a group of five people ages 64-85 who had lived for at least 10 years in an area with water containing 1 ppm fluoride, the average fluoride concentration of the iliac crest bone was 2,250 ppm of bone ash " (24, pp. 53-54). It is extraordinary to me that a leading US agency should be relying on measurements made on " five people " . The sad truth of the matter is that the US PHS has spent many more millions of dollars promoting fluoridation than it has investigating the effect that fluoridation has had on the American people. Belatedly, an investigation has been carried out comparing the fluoride levels in the iliac crest bone in citizens in Montreal (non- fluoridated) and Toronto (fluoridated). The initial results of this study by Dr. Limeback and colleagues have been reported to the annual meeting of the International Association for Dental Research in 1999. These results indicate that the levels are about twice as high in the bones of the Toronto residents. This is a disturbing finding, since Toronto was only fluoridated in 1963. We have yet to have any human being on this planet exposed to artificially fluoridated water for a lifetime. We have little idea what levels of fluoride will be in the bones of someone who lives into their 60s, 70s, 80s or 90s who has had lifetime exposure to fluoridated water as well as all the other sources we are exposed to today. It is incredible that despite the importance of this Canadian study its funding has been discontinued. If governmental authorities in fluoridated countries wish to retain any semblance of credibility on this issue, these type of studies need to be carried out with greater intensity, not less. The fear is that the increases in dental fluorosis in our children today may foreshadow the damage to their bones that will come in the future. .. Meanwhile, there are numerous studies in the published literature (four published in the Journal of the American Medical Association alone) which demonstrate an association between water fluoridation, or naturally occurring fluoride, and increased hip fractures in the elderly, particularly women who were exposed to fluoride prior to menopause (25-30). Does it make sense to protect our teeth (possibly) when we are young, and then break our bones (possibly) when we are old? By whom should such a trade-off be made? This is not a trivial issue. According to Harold Slavkin, Director of the National Institute of Dental and Cranofacial Research (formerly the NIDR), " About one-half of the people with hip fractures end up in nursing homes, and in the year following the fracture, 20 per cent of them die " (35). Another set of findings which has been outrageously downplayed in my view is a possible association between water fluoridation (or fluoride exposure) and osteosarcoma (bone cancer) in young males. CHRONIC FATIGUE & FLUORIDE Flouride is associated with " chronic fatigue syndrome " , and there is a relationship between chronic fatigue and pineal gland calcification (Sandyk and Awerbuch, 1994) with the latter consisting of apatite crystals similar in size and structure to dentin and bone (Nakamura, et al. 1995). Similarly, the cognitive difficulties that result from exposure to fluoride (Spittle, 1994) are accompanied by general malaise and fatigue; intolerance to low levels of environmental chemicals is a polysymptomatic sequela of chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, etc. resulting from an immunological and/or a neurogenic triggering of somatic symptoms and inflammation (Bell, et al. 1998); and the earliest subjective symptoms of osteo-fluorosis are *arthritic* in nature. Side-effects of fluoride treatment also include gastro-intestinal problems simply referred to as -- " symptoms " (Riggs, et al. 1990); " intolerance " (Dequeker and Declerick, 1993); and " complaints " (Lips, 1998). In two separate studies, the comparative results between patients receiving fluoride treatment for 3-12 months (Das, et al. 1994) and those having documented osteo-fluorosis (Dasarathy, et al. 1996) were identical - 70% endoscopic abnormalities, 70-90% histologic chronic atrophic gastritis; and 100% microscopic abnormalities such as loss of " microvilli " . Moreover, these affects were also qualitatively similar to a study (Gupta, et al. 1992) that correlated non-ulcer dyspepsia with ingested fluoride level. As expected, symptoms occurring at the (RTECS) human acute TDLo dosage of only 214 ug/kg are " gastrointestinal " . --- Similar to the claims for 'curing " osteoporosis, fluoride has been proposed as a preventive measure (sic) against Alzheimer's Disease (AD) based on the " presumption " that by direct competition in the gut, fluoride would decrease aluminum uptake (Kraus and Forbes, 1992). Rather, such antagonism (Li, et al. 1990) is DUE to the formation of aluminum- fluoride complex (Li, et al. 1991). That fluoride " potentiates' *neuro- toxicity* of aluminum has been substantiated (van der Voet, et.al. 1999) -- consisting of interference with neuronal cytoskeleton metabolism. Aluminum accumulations have been found in nuclei of the paired-helical filament (PHF) containing neurons in the brains of both AD patients and elderly normal controls (Shore and Wyatt, 1983) Also, fluoride decreases protein content of brain tissue (Shashi, et al. 1994) with 7-months of 30-ppm fluoride resulting in a 10% decrease in total brain phospholipid content (Guan, et.al. 1998) – as well as (biphasic) changes in " brain levels " of *COENZYME-Q* (Wang, et al. 1997) The theory behind fluoride's purported benefit to teeth is that the fluoride ion displaces the hydroxide ion from the calcium hydroxyapatite in the tooth enamel, forming the substance calcium fluorapatite, which is more resistant to acid attack. A second suggestion is that fluoride kills some of the decay causing bacteria in the mouth by poisoning their enzymes . However, these mechanisms pose three huge questions, which have plagued this matter for over 50 years. 1) Can you poison the enzymes in the oral bacteria, without poisoning some of the enzymes in the rest of the body? Nearly every single chemical reaction in the body is steered by enzymes (enzymes are biological catalysts) CONCLUSION: " Fluoridation is a scientific fraud, probably the greatest fraud of the century " . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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