CRUSADOR investigative reporter Pam Killeen interviews Paul Connett, PhD., a specialist in Environmental Chemistry and Toxicology, and Professor of Chemistry at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York.

Dr. Paul Connett is relentless in his mission to stop the use of fluoride. He is concerned that consumers are simply not doing enough to stop cities from adding fluoride to municipal water supplies. Those who question the safety and efficacy of fluoride have done things such as filtered their water or switched to un-fluoridated toothpaste. But, is this truly enough? Those who are informed about the dangers of fluoride may be protected, but what about the uninformed?

Many elite scientists, such as Dr. Connett, have voiced their legitimate concerns about fluoride. It seems, however, that their voices go unheard by groups like the Center for Disease Control (CDC) or the American Dental Association (ADA). With so many scientists questioning the safety of fluoride, what has happened to the Precautionary Principle, “if in doubt, leave it out?” According to Dr. Connett, even the CDC won’t debate him on this issue and yet they are supposed to be protecting us. The collusion between science, government and industry is most apparent when examining the fluoride industry. As you read Dr. Connett’s comments and study his website www.fluoridealert.org, you will be amazed to learn about the empty science that has been used to justify the use of fluoride in society. The fluoride industry is just another example of how industry has turned consumers into human waste disposals. Be sure to read this gripping interview to find out what you can do to help stop the fluoridation of city water.

Pam: There are several environmental issues on the table right now. Why did you become interested in fluoride?

Dr. Connett: I began studying the subject of fluoridated water about 9 years ago. When I learned how toxic the substance was, I realized that people needed to be educated about the risks of fluoridation. One of the facts I found most striking was how low the level of fluoride was in mother’s milk – it averages about 0.008 ppm. When you add fluoride to drinking water at 1ppm you are giving bottle fed babies over100 times the levels nature intended. This is a risky business and you are asking for trouble. In 1950, when they began fluoridating water, not one single trial had been completed which proved the safety or effectiveness of fluoride. It was not scientific in 1950 and it’s not scientific today. They tell people that it’s safe and effective when they can’t even back up their claims. They cannot even defend it in a rational debate even when they are challenged to do so by the US EPA. They’re putting a known toxin into our drinking water. It’s absolutely pathetic that the CDC (Center for Disease Control) is promoting and propagandizing fluoridation. The CDC pushed out a report in 1999 claiming that fluoridation was one of the top 10 public health achievements of the 20th century. All of the countries that support fluoridation also tout this claim (Canada, US, NZ, England, Ireland, Australia). They all quote this bloody CDC report! When you really look at it, it’s based upon junk science (see www.fluorideACTION.net/CDC.htm ). Absolute junk! As far as the health issues are concerned, they were years out of date. The report that came out in 1999 only cited one reference that showed fluoride was safe and this was a study that came out in 1993. Six years out of date. I can’t believe it. Taxpayers’ money went into this fraud! One would think that the CDC should be on top of good science. After all, they’re supposed to be working in our best interests…right?!

Pam: As a Professor of Environmental Chemistry and Toxicology, can you tell us about the dangers of fluoride?

Dr. Connett: This toxic substance has a very small, if any, margin of safety. In a public water system, you can’t control the dose because you can’t control how much water people drink or the fluoride they get from other sources. Also, the fluoride that they put in the water is not pharmaceutical grade fluoride, which is what is used for testing purposes. What they put in the water supply is an industrial waste product. It comes from the wet scrubbers of the phosphate fertilizer industry. In other words, they’re capturing air pollution (hydrogen fluoride and silicon tetrachloride) which, for about a hundred years, decimated local vegetation and farm animals. By international law, this captured liquid (hexafluorosilicic acid) cannot be dumped into the sea but they are allowed to put it into tanker trucks, send it all over the country, and dump it into our drinking water! It’s sheer madness. But the phosphate fertilizer industry saves at least $100 million a year doing it. Money talks, but I believe the biggest obstacle to halting this archaic practice right now is the huge loss of credibility that the US Public Health Service will sustain when the public realizes that they’ve been lying through their teeth for several years.

Pam: In order to find the root of the problem, it’s important to “follow the money”. Have you examined who else is behind this fluoride issue?

Dr. Connett: Chris Bryson, a former BBC correspondent, who wrote the book, The Fluoride Deception, which took him 10 years to write, contains over 100 pages of documentation. The book explains that fluoridation was an industrial ploy to detoxify the image of fluoride. They were facing massive lawsuits from local farmers and workers. Farmers were worried about fluoride pollution damaging their land and industry was worried about potential lawsuits from workers exposed to fluoride in the workplace. Instead of saying that fluoride was toxic, they created a campaign saying that fluoride was good for you. This pulled the rug from under any potential lawsuit. How can you say that fluoride is damaging peoples’ health when the US government is putting it into the drinking water? That’s one well-supported thesis. Incredibly, Bryson was able to show active collusion between people from the US Public Health Service and the Fluorine Lawyers Association, which were there to protect industry from fluoride lawsuits. Why? It’s ridiculous.

Pam: What other groups are supporting fluoridation?

Dr. Connett: A great deal of money goes into dental research based upon fluoridation. As long as we have fluoridation, millions of dollars are being put into dental research (fluorosis, tooth decay, etc....). As long as dental researchers support the notion that fluoride is good for teeth, the money will keep rolling in. If they change their minds, their money supply will run out.

Pam: Is fluoride truly effective in the reduction of tooth decay?

Dr. Connett: As far as effectiveness is concerned, the CDC produced a pathetic graph in their 1999 report, that if an undergraduate had done for me, I would have failed them. This graph has a line showing tooth decay declining for 12 year olds in the US from the 60’s to the 90’s. On the same graph, they have the percentage of the population in the US drinking fluoridated water -- that line is shown going up. The notion was that tooth decay has been decreasing while the percentage of people drinking fluoridated water has been increasing. If they had spent 10 minutes researching the WHO (World Health Organization) website, they would have discovered that tooth decay for 12 year olds has been declining in practically every industrialized country around the world. We have presented this graphically at http://www.fluorideACTION.net/who-dmft.htm In these graphs 14 of these countries are not fluoridated; four of them are. The data shows that tooth decay is on the decline in every industrialized country and it has nothing to do with fluoridation. There are 2 conclusions you can derive from this CDC report: either it’s total incompetence or they totally misled the public, hoping that people wouldn’t spend the time to check their material.

Pam: Statistical manipulation seems to be quite prevalent amongst the industry-sponsored data today.

Dr. Connett: You know, Pam, it’s common sense – you don’t have to lie about anything that is good. It’s very discouraging to see the propaganda that is being used by companies like Monsanto who have manipulated the data around PCB’s, dioxins, aspartame and now genetic engineering. Corporations shouldn’t have to behave that way. Universities and corporations don’t have to fire scientists because they don’t find the results that they are looking for to push certain products. Universities, government agencies and corporations shouldn’t have to avoid debates. If what they are promoting to the public is good, they should be completely open and honest about it.

Pam: Can you tell us your thoughts about the conflicts of interest which occur at the university level? Is there too much corporate money going into the universities? Should this be stopped?

Dr. Connett: One of the worst offenders on that is Harvard. With the Harvard name on the top of your paper you can literally get away with murder. Not all, but a number of prestigious scientists at Harvard have whitewashed toxics for industry. There is a lot of evidence that shows that when industry funds studies, the results go in one way and when it’s not industry funded the results go in a different way. There is a very clear relationship between who’s funding the study and the outcome you get. A recent Harvard study was released showing that if young boys (between the ages of 6-8) are exposed to fluoride in their drinking water, they have a significant increased chance of developing osteosarcoma, a frequently fatal bone cancer. Elise Bassin received her PhD for doing this very important study. Her advisor, Harvard Professor Chester Douglass has attempted to cover-up her work. Just one year after he had signed her thesis he told an audience in England that there was no such relationship. It is a complete coincidence of course that he happens to be the editor for Colgate’s “Oral Health Report”! Even though the research was done in 2001, the public has only just learned about it. For those who believe that fluoride is beneficial, I would like to ask them this: “How many teeth would you have to save to justify even one child dying from bone cancer, or lowering their IQ, or causing hip fractures in the elderly?”

Pam: Based upon Dr. Bassin’s research, I understand that there’s been some progress to stop fluoridation. Eleven EPA employee unions representing over 7000 environmental and public health professionals of the Civil Service have called for a moratorium on drinking water fluoridation programs across the country, and have asked EPA management to recognize fluoride as posing a serious risk of causing cancer in people.

Dr. Connett: Yes, this has received major newspaper coverage around the country and we are asking people to sign an Online petition in support of their dramatic initiative. We desperately need the promoters of this practice to testify and be cross-examined by Congress under oath. Every signature on this petition takes us a little closer to achieving that important goal. If your readers want to help, they can go and sign on and write a little comment of their own at: http://www.powalliance.org/petition

Pam: What should the public do to help bring integrity back to the scientific community?

Dr. Connett: The most important thing we can instill in our students is to tell the truth. This is far more important than simply learning the periodic table! If you’re a scientist, and you don’t tell the truth, you’re no longer a scientist. If a scientist deliberately lies, by manipulating the data, he should be required to give up his degree. If a student gets a PhD, he should know that the degree is only valid as long as he tells the truth. There’s no science without truth. It’s something else (public relations, propaganda, politics, etc…). These lies are very dangerous for public health policy. If public health policy is not supported by honest science, then we’re in deep, deep trouble. Not only because we’re not getting the right public policy, but because there will be a complete lack of trust when people find out the truth. We need to trust these agencies (CDC, NIH, etc...). If the CDC tells us we need to worry about something, we may completely ignore them because we’ve become so immune to their lies. If they lie about fluoridation, then they’re probably lying about other things. We need to cut the cancer of dishonest science out of public health policy.

Pam: The issue of fluoridation has become so controversial. It seems there’s no room for debate.

Dr. Connett: Even in academic circles scientists don’t seem to like controversy. They are not used to challenging authority. This is sad. If we can’t handle controversy in the US, then there’s no democracy. Democracy is about handling controversy. They shouldn’t accept the brainwashing of one side, because it’s the status quo. They need to examine both sides with an open mind. That’s what education is supposed to be all about. We’re not doing this. It is almost as if we have gone back to a time before Galileo and the US Surgeon General has become a new Pope!

Pam: Where else do you find this type of corruption and collusion?

Dr. Connett: Consumers need to also be aware that the EPA is allowing Dow to use sulfuryl fluoride as a fumigant on foodstuffs. That’s going to jack up fluoride levels in our food. The proposed limit of fluoride on powdered eggs is 900 ppm. This is sheer lunacy. On a tube of toothpaste (1000 ppm) you re told if a kid swallows more than a pea size amount that they should be taken to a poison center.

Pam: How many pea-sized portions of powdered egg go into an omelette or a cake?

Dr. Connett: Another example is the sugar industry. The year before the US endorsed fluoridation (1950), the sugar industry said that they needed to find a way to reduce tooth decay without reducing sugar consumption. Fluoride was a magic bullet for the sugar industry. The biggest health effect of fluoridation is that it gives the “green light” to parents for their kids to eat as much sugar as they want. They use fluoride to mask the problems surrounding sugar. Now, of course, we also see an epidemic with obesity. This obesity may well be a consequence of fluoride’s ability to lower the activity of the thyroid gland.

Pam: We are being bombarded with distractions so that the truth is hidden. Dr. Weston A. Price traveled around the world in the 1920’s in order to discover the ideal diet. As a dentist, he began to see the deterioration in teeth after North Americans began consuming more sugar or processed foods. In primitive cultures where people didn’t have access to sugar or processed foods, they had beautiful teeth and dental structure and enjoyed excellent health. He discovered that crooked teeth, overbites, underbites, cavities really only become a problem in cultures that consumed sugar or processed foods.

Dr. Connett: Dr. Price discovered the nutritional truth surrounding the real cause of tooth decay and disease. Fluoride has distracted people from the truth – that they should rely on dietary changes to improve their teeth.

Pam: You’ve made it your mission to stop fluoridation internationally. I commend you for your hard work.

Dr. Connett: I’d stake my whole scientific reputation on being right on the fluoride issue – that it’s neither effective nor safe. It’s a silly, dangerous policy. It’s frustrating not being able to have a healthy, rational discourse, exchange arguments in public so that people can hear both sides. Denying this debate is ridiculous. I have forgotten who said, “A beautiful theory can be destroyed by an ugly fact” but in the case of fluoridation, there are too many ugly facts. Accepting the doctrine of fluoridation is like religious fanaticism.

Pam: This same type of fanaticism has not only brought us fluoride, but mercury, GMO’s, etc…It seems that some scientists are desperate to hold on to their findings. It reminds me of the saying “publish or perish”. We all need to ask more questions about the credibility and the motives of a lot of the research being released.

Dr. Connett: There is a big difference between being clever and being wise. We reward cleverness -and that’s what fluoride is - it’s clever but it’s not wise. The same can be said for genetic engineering - it’s clever but it’s not wise.

Pam: So it’s really up to grassroots movements to help bring this information forward. It’s going to take a concerted effort from enthusiastic and concerned scientists and activists to help turn this situation around.

Dr. Connett: We’ve got to simplify these issues so that the public better understands them. We also must stress the importance about being honest. People can no longer be blasé about dishonesty and lying in science or government. There are so many awful things happening now I think that things are losing their shock value. It seems as though people are getting used to the lies. Civil servants are supposed to be giving the most accurate, honest information to the decision-makers. We expect the civil servants to be working in the public’s best interest, but they’re not. They’re spinning as much as the politicians. That’s very clear in the case of fluoridation and the CDC.

Pam: I hope that one day you’ll be able to have a healthy debate with the CDC on this subject. Thank you for all of your hard work. Any last comments?

Dr. Connett: We simply can’t avoid the problem by thinking we can filter out fluoride. Some filtration systems, such as reverse osmosis, will help remove fluoride, but people who live in poverty cannot afford bottled water or filters. People who live in poverty are at risk and need protection. Before I die, I want to see fluoride removed from our water so that we can all be protected from its damaging effects. Meanwhile, my dearest hope is that we can force the proponents to testify under oath and be cross-examined at a Congressional hearing but that’s going to take a lot of pressure on Congress and a lot of names on the Online petition.

Please be sure to support Dr. Connett, by signing this very important Online petition:  http://www.powalliance.org/petition

Pam Killeen can be reached at Pam@PamKilleen.com. You can view Pam’s website at www.PamKilleen.com.