Anti-Stress Nutrition Programme to Improve Mood,
Health, Behaviour and Learning
By Brenda Sampson
FLUORIDE
Fluoride probably strengthens the enamel of young children's teeth. But is this a good thing? Max Bircher Benner, a Swiss doctor at the beginning of this century, was the medical officer for two Swiss institutions, a boarding school for children of the wealthy and a Catholic orphanage. In the first the children ate a lot of sweet food, while the children at the orphanage, which was run on a shoestring, ate mostly the produce from the garden, fresh fruit and vegetables with home grown milk, eggs, homemade wholemeal bread and oat porridge, little meat; even the nuns only had meat on Sundays.
The wealthy children had the usual ailments, and many cavities. The orphanage children had good health and few cavities. Later Bircher Benner wrote a book entitled "Children's diet". In it, he says that dental decay is the first indication of inadequate and improper diet. If this warning signal is ignored, more serious illness will develop in other parts of the body.
Fluoride prevents decay and removes the valuable warning signal. Since it was introduced, children's teeth have improved and their health has deteriorated. We are ashamed of our national statistics for asthma and cot death. A pre-school teacher says eczema is increasing. A primary school principal said that almost all of the five year old new entrants have ear infections.
In 1956, before fluoride was used in New Zealand, I was introduced to an academic family with three children who were using fluoride tablets. The mother proudly showed me the children's mouths; not one cavity among the three. But the children had the whitest faces I had ever seen. In those days New Zealand children looked bonny with rosy cheeks, the white cheeks were conspicuous. Today, most New Zealand children have pale faces; it is unusual to see a pink cheeked child.
Why does fluoride harden the enamel ? I read this explanation in Penguin "Science News" in the 1950's when there was much discussion about fluoride. Fluoride is so extremely poisonous that the body eliminates about 75% of it in urine within a few hours (provided that the kidneys are working properly). With chemicals it is always difficult to get rid of the last residues. So with fluoride the last residues are shunted away into the safest, most inaccessible place, where they will do the least harm. With children under seven who are growing their second teeth, the enamel is a good place, so that is where the fluoride goes.
Here is a story about a New Zealand town. The city council had a majority of under 9,000. Residents took up a petition to have fluoride removed from the water and got 9,000 signatures. They said, "If you do not remove the fluoride, we will vote you out of office." So it was removed. A nurse living there said that babies with eczema began to heal in a fortnight. Lastly, a story about one of our members. When we bought a water purifier, she asked me if she could try some of the water and came twice a week to fill a few flagons. After ten days, she said, "My two and half year old baby has had a stuffed up nose since he was five weeks old. And now after a few days on pure water, it has come unstuffed!" So she bought one herself. People who are well informed on the subject and have the money, are buying water purifiers. The reliable ones cost between $100 and $900, but poor people cannot afford this expense. Rather than the water being poisoned, the right of manufacturers to pressure sell chemical ad sugar loaded foods that destroy children's teeth and health, should be restricted.
