Posts Tagged sodium benzoate and leukemia

… B12 or placebo (sugar pill). After 6 months the researchers reported dramatically reduced numbers and severity of these nasty little mouth sores. Interestingly enough, these benefits occurred even …

EPA’s Union of Scientists’ “WHITE PAPER”

Why Union Opposes Fluoridation

May 1, 1999

The following documents why our union, formerly National Federation of Federal Employees Local 2050 and since April 1998 Chapter 280 of the National Treasury Employees Union, took the stand it did opposing fluoridation of drinking water supplies. Our union is comprised of and represents the approximately 1500 scientists, lawyers, engineers and other professional employees at EPA Headquarters here in Washington, D.C.

The union first became interested in this issue rather by accident. Like most Americans, including many physicians and dentists, most of our members had thought that fluoride’s only effects were beneficial – reductions in tooth decay, etc. We too believed assurances of safety and effectiveness of water fluoridation.

Then, as EPA was engaged in revising its drinking water standard for fluoride in 1985, an employee came to the union with a complaint: he said he was being forced to write into the regulation a statement to the effect that EPA thought it was alright for children to have “funky” teeth. It was OK, EPA said, because it considered that condition to be only a cosmetic effect, not an adverse health effect. The reason for this EPA position was that it was under political pressure to set its health-based standard for fluoride at 4 mg/liter. At that level, EPA knew that a significant number of children develop moderate to severe dental fluorosis, but since it had deemed the effect as only cosmetic, EPA didn’t have to set its health-based standard at a lower level to prevent it.

We tried to settle this ethics issue quietly, within the family, but EPA was unable or unwilling to resist external political pressure, and we took the fight public with a union amicus curiae brief in a lawsuit filed against EPA by a public interest group. The union has published on this initial involvement period in detail.\1

Since then our opposition to drinking water fluoridation has grown, based on the scientific literature documenting the increasingly out-of-control exposures to fluoride, the lack of benefit to dental health from ingestion of fluoride and the hazards to human health from such ingestion. These hazards include acute toxic hazard, such as to people with impaired kidney function, as well as chronic toxic hazards of gene mutations, cancer, reproductive effects, neurotoxicity, bone pathology and dental fluorosis. First, a review of recent neurotoxicity research results.

In 1995, Mullenix and co-workers \2 showed that rats given fluoride in drinking water at levels that give rise to plasma fluoride concentrations in the range seen in humans suffer neurotoxic effects that vary according to when the rats were given the fluoride – as adult animals, as young animals, or through the placenta before birth. Those exposed before birth were born hyperactive and remained so throughout their lives. Those exposed as young or adult animals displayed depressed activity. Then in 1998, Guan and co-workers \3 gave doses similar to those used by the Mullenix research group to try to understand the mechanism(s) underlying the effects seen by the Mullenix group. Guan’s group found that several key chemicals in the brain – those that form the membrane of brain cells – were substantially depleted in rats given fluoride, as compared to those who did not get fluoride.

Another 1998 publication by Varner, Jensen and others \4 reported on the brain- and kidney damaging effects in rats that were given fluoride in drinking water at the same level deemed “optimal” by pro-fluoridation groups, namely 1 part per million (1 ppm). Even more pronounced damage was seen in animals that got the fluoride in conjunction with aluminum. These results are especially disturbing because of the low dose level of fluoride that shows the toxic effect in rats – rats are more resistant to fluoride than humans. This latter statement is based on Mullenix’s finding that it takes substantially more fluoride in the drinking water of rats than of humans to reach the same fluoride level in plasma. It is the level in plasma that determines how much fluoride is “seen” by particular tissues in the body. So when rats get 1 ppm in drinking water, their brains and kidneys are exposed to much less fluoride than humans getting 1 ppm, yet they are experiencing toxic effects. Thus we are compelled to consider the likelihood that humans are experiencing damage to their brains and kidneys at the “optimal” level of 1 ppm.

In support of this concern are results from two epidemiology studies from China\5,\6 that show decreases in I.Q. in children who get more fluoride than the control groups of children in each study. These decreases are about 5 to 10 I.Q. points in children aged 8 to 13 years.

Another troubling brain effect has recently surfaced: fluoride’s interference with the function of the brain’s pineal gland. The pineal gland produces melatonin which, among other roles, mediates the body’s internal clock, doing such things as governing the onset of puberty. Jennifer Luke\7 has shown that fluoride accumulates in the pineal gland and inhibits its production of melatonin. She showed in test animals that this inhibition causes an earlier onset of sexual maturity, an effect reported in humans as well in 1956, as part of the Kingston/Newburgh study, which is discussed below. In fluoridated Newburgh, young girls experienced earlier onset of menstruation (on average, by six months) than girls in non-fluoridated Kingston \8.

From a risk assessment perspective, all these brain effect data are particularly compelling and disturbing because they are convergent.

We looked at the cancer data with alarm as well. There are epidemiology studies that are convergent with whole-animal and single-cell studies (dealing with the cancer hazard), just as the neurotoxicity research just mentioned all points in the same direction. EPA fired the Office of Drinking Water’s chief toxicologist, Dr. William Marcus, who also was our local union’s treasurer at the time, for refusing to remain silent on the cancer risk issue\9 . The judge who heard the lawsuit he brought against EPA over the firing made that finding – that EPA fired him over his fluoride work and not for the phony reason put forward by EPA management at his dismissal. Dr. Marcus won his lawsuit and is again at work at EPA. Documentation is available on request.

The type of cancer of particular concern with fluoride, although not the only type, is osteosarcoma, especially in males. The National Toxicology Program conducted a two-year study \10 in which rats and mice were given sodium fluoride in drinking water. The positive result of that study (in which malignancies in tissues other than bone were also observed), particularly in male rats, is convergent with a host of data from tests showing fluoride’s ability to cause mutations (a principal “trigger” mechanism for inducing a cell to become cancerous) e.g.\11a, b, c, d and data showing increases in osteosarcomas in young men in New Jersey \12 , Washington and Iowa \13 based on their drinking fluoridated water. It was his analysis, repeated statements about all these and other incriminating cancer data, and his requests for an independent, unbiased evaluation of them that got Dr. Marcus fired.

Bone pathology other than cancer is a concern as well. An excellent review of this issue was published by Diesendorf et al. in 1997 \14. Five epidemiology studies have shown a higher rate of hip fractures in fluoridated vs. non-fluoridated communities. \15a, b, c, d, e. Crippling skeletal fluorosis was the endpoint used by EPA to set its primary drinking water standard in 1986, and the ethical deficiencies in that standard setting process prompted our union to join the Natural Resources Defense Council in opposing the standard in court, as mentioned above.

The recommendation was that doctors should now consider preemptively medicating any patient whose blood pressure was creeping up towards the 140/90 cut off point. I remember thinking, “Are these people out of their minds? Now there is such thing as treating a ‘pre-disease’?” I thought. Worst yet, they treat these “pre-diseases” with medications that have not even proven their worth in treating the actual “disease”?

Needless to say, we at Your Prescription for Health did not sit quietly by and allow them to decree fabricated claims of disease prevention. We quickly wrote articles and stood angrily atop of our soap boxes to preach the fallacy of this ridiculous conclusion. Months later, it was determined that this “panel of experts” were actually cronies for the drug companies—having direct ties to the companies that make drugs used to treat hypertension, and now, pre-hypertension. Alas, the word was out and the damage done. Medicine had accepted their phony pre-disease as another medical “fact” that was beyond contestation.

Recently, a controversial article that was published in the reputable Cochrane Database of Systemic Reviews, issue 3, determined that lowering blood pressure to levels below 140/90 provided no benefit to the risk of heart attack, strokes or funeral rates (death rates per year). In this review, lowering blood pressure to 135/85 compared to 140/90 did nothing to improve the health and longevity of over 22,000 patients in the review.

So, yes, this is a big “I told you so!” It is not our first and it certainly will not be our last! But, I don’t want to end with an “I told you so.” Let’s talk about blood pressure, why it happens and how to fix it.

First, I am going to speak in generalities here. There certainly are extenuating circumstances that could lead to atypical hypertension. These include the use of certain medication and kidney disease. We will not discuss these less common situations in the interest of helping the majority of our readers. This article is for people who have run-of-the-mill hypertension without any definitive cause; this is called “idiopathic hypertension”. People with idiopathic hypertension often ask the doctor, “why is my blood pressure high?” and they receive the dismissive reply, “because you are getting older.”

The number one cause of elevated blood pressure is what we call “metabolic syndrome” or “insulin resistance”. This occurs when we consume more carbohydrates than our body can tolerate. When this happens, insulin steadily increases resulting in a catastrophic series of biochemical events that causes blood vessel constriction and water retention. Here is a quick and easy method to begin correcting this health issue:

1. Regulate the amount of carbohydrate that you consume. People with insulin resistance may want to consider decreasing carbohydrate intake to approximately 20% of their daily caloric intake. So if your daily caloric intake is 2,000 kilocalories; 20% equates to approximately 400 kilocalories or 100 grams of carbohydrates. After the body has normalized, you may be able to increase this to 25-30%.

2. Pay attention to the quality of carbohydrate that you consume on a daily basis. A high quality carbohydrate is one with a low glycemic load. For more information on glycemic load, see www.mendosa.com .

3. Exercise at least 5 days a week for at least one-hour. Exercise burns sugar and fat while improving insulin sensitivity. Most people do not exercise often enough, nor do they exercise for long enough. Commit to one-hour a day, if you do this then you will enjoy improved blood pressure and overall health and wellbeing. Your exercise program should include weight training, walking (or light jogging) and stretching.

4. Eat your fruits and veggies. There is no faster way to help normalize the potassium/sodium balance in the body than to cut the amount of refined/prepared foods while filling the void with fruits and vegetables.

5. Supplement to correct deficiencies and improve blood vessel health. Rather than taking herbs for blood pressure, we want to correct deficiencies that may cause elevated blood pressure. These include:

a. Omega-3 fatty acids – Fish oil is the best for improving blood pressure.

b. Magnesium/Potassium aspartate – Be careful if you are on medications for blood pressure as some medications, such as ACE inhibitors, can increase potassium levels to dangerous levels. Standard dose: 2 capsules two to three times daily.

c. Vitamin D3 – This will enhance the absorption of minerals such as potassium and magnesium while providing other benefits to the cardiovascular system. 2,000-4,000 iu daily.

d. HTN Complex – This formula is designed for those who need to more aggressively lower blood pressure. It contains many nutritional and herbal ingredients to improve blood pressure when the above mentioned measures are insufficient. Recommended dose: 2 capsules twice daily.