The Effects of Fluoride on Children's Cognitive Development

I still remember, as a child, making conscious efforts to drink more tap water, after my dentist recommended that the Fluoride content would improve my dental health. As an adult, I find myself stupefied at how a medical professional could place the cognitive development of a child in harms way by being unable to connect the dots of over 23 human, and 100 animal studies which have linked fluoride to brain damage.

The Poison Is In The Dose (Or Is It?)

A recent Harvard meta-analysis has concluded that children who live in areas with highly fluoridated water have significantly lower IQ scores than those who live in low fluoride areas. The researchers performed a systematic review and meta-analysis of published studies on increased fluoride exposure in drinking water and neurodevelopmental delays. A compendium of 27 studies published over 22 years suggested an inverse relationship between high fluoride exposure and children’s intelligence. That is, higher fluoride = lower IQ. Interestingly, fluoride’s neurotoxic effects are more pronounced in children than in adults. The fluoride concentrations found in blood (serum-fluoride) can exceed levels of more than 1000-times those of some other neurotoxicants that cause neurodevelopmental damage.

Is This Really News?

There is a wealth of evidence against fluoride which reaches beyond lowered IQ in children. Other reported effects of fluoride include:

• Risk to the thyroid gland via it’s endocrine disrupting effects.
• The ability to diminish bone strength and increase risk for bone fracture.
• Increased risk of fluoride toxicity in individuals with kidney disease.
• The accumultion of fluoride in the pineal gland.
• Damage to the hippocampus.
• Impaired immune system.
• Increased tumor and cancer rate.
• Inactivation of 62 enzymes and the inhibition of more than 100 others.

What To Do, What To Do?

The scary reality is that fluoride is difficult to avoid. Joining the ongoing effort to get fluoride out of drinking water, is the only sure-fire way to ensure it’s removal from circulation. However, in the mean time there are several steps you can take to reduce your fluoride exposure -

1. Buy fluoride-free toothpaste and mouthwash.
2. Purchase a reverse-osmosis filter for your tap water.
3. Opt for bottled water, which (currently) has a lower fluoride content.

Reference:

Choi, A. L., Sun, G., Zhang, Y., & Grandjean, P. (2012). Developmental fuloride neurotoxicity: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Environmental Health Perspectives, 120(10), 1362-1368.

National Toxicology Program (1990). Toxicology and Carcinogenesis Studies of Sodium Fluoride in F344/N Rats and B6C3f1 Mice. Technical report Series No. 393. NIH Publ. No 91-2848. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Research Triangle Park, N.C.

Hoover, R.N., et al. (1991). Time trends for bone and joint cancers and osteosarcomas in the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) Program. National Cancer Institute In: Review of Fluoride: Benefits and Risks. US Public Health Service. Appendix E & F.

Cohn, P.D (1992). A Brief Rep-ort On The Association Of Drinking Water Fluoridation And The Incidence of Osteosarcoma Among Young Males. New Jersey Department of Health Environ. Health Service: 1- 17.

Bassin, E.B., Wypij, D., Davis, R.B., Mittleman, M.A. (2006). Age-specific Fluoride Exposure in Drinking Water and Osteosarcoma (United States). Cancer Causes and Control 17: 421-8.

Johnson, W., et al. (1979). Fluoridation and bone disease in renal patients. In: E Johansen, DR Taves, TO Olsen, Eds. Continuing Evaluation of the Use of Fluorides. AAAS Selected Symposium. Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado. pp. 275-293.

Ittel T.H., et al. (1992). Effect of fluoride on aluminum-induced bone disease in rats with renal failure. Kidney International 41: 1340-1348.