Latest / Beyond Labels Premium / Episode #167: Breaking News: Federal Judge Questions Fluoride Safety in Historic Ruling

Transcript

Episode #167: Breaking News: Federal Judge Questions Fluoride Safety in Historic Ruling · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: This decision by this judge has been dubbed the most historic ruling in the U.S.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: fluoridation debate.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: And it's thought that it could significantly impact the practice of adding fluoride to drinking water in the United States.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, um, I saw a news headline just uh two days ago where RFK Jr.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: is saying that a Trump White House would immediately push to remove fluoride from water.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Hi, everybody.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to another episode of Beyond Labels with your hosts, Joel Salatin.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: That would be me, the farmer, and our favorite researcher, Dr.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: Cena McCullough.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Fluoride.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a big topic in public drinking water systems for a long, long time.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: And a federal judge in California has just ruled that there's unreasonable risks to children regarding fluoride, uh, as if I guess old people don't matter, but yeah, that's another subject.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so to delve into this a little bit, um, we're gonna we're gonna focus today's episode on this fluoride issue.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: And Cena's gonna give us some of the background and we'll dig into it.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Joel.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: So an upwards of 75% of Americans drink uh fluoridated water.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, this is their the tap water that we're talking about that comes into most of Americans' homes.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: Well, in September of this year, like Joel said, a federal judge stated that the fluoride and drinking water could pose a risk to the IQ of children.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: This was U.S.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: District Judge Edward Chen.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: And he said that while his finding doesn't quote, conclude with certainty that fluoridated water is harmful to public health, he said there's mounting research pointing to an unreasonable risk.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: And he ordered the Environmental Protection Agency or the EPA to take steps to lower that risk.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: He did not say what the steps should be, but he ordered them to do it.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: So this decision by this judge has been dubbed the most historic ruling in the U.S.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: fluoridation debate.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it's thought that it could significantly impact the practice of adding fluoride to drinking water in the United States.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, um, I saw a news headline just uh two days ago where RFK Jr.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: is saying that a Trump White House would immediately push to remove fluoride from water.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so this is this is big time.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: And as as Joel, as you already mentioned, adding fluoride to the public drinking water has been hailed as one of the greatest public health achievements in the last century, right?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: It is said to strengthen teeth, reduce cavities by replacing minerals that may have been lost during normal wear and tear, um, to reduce cavities in children.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Now, opponents have long argued that fluoride in the drinking water can lower IQ, can contribute to developmental delays in children, also thyroid problems, including hypothyroidism, kidney and liver damage, bone cancer, hormone imbalance, and numerous other health issues.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: And now it is finally being scrutinized in the judicial system.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: For the first time ever, a federal judge has weighed in on the developmental risks that it may actually pose to children.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I want to say this is rare.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_01: This is rare for a judge to go ahead and disagree with the federal agency on a scientific matter, right?
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: In this case, like I said, the court found that the EPA's assessment of the level of fluoride that is quote unquote safe to drink was not adequately considering the potential risk associated with those fluoride levels.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: So the so the judge is basically saying that the EPA is wrong, right?
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: That they didn't actually do the job that they were supposed to do to make sure that this is safe.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: So this is very rare.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, I actually that's one of the things I thought about.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like, of course, I don't know this judge, you know, personally, haven't talked to this judge, but the timing, right?
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: The time, because let me tell you a little bit more about the timing and what you're saying actually makes perfect sense.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: So, one of the studies that this judge leaned heavily on in making this decision was a review by the national toxicology program.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, the national toxicology program is a government agency that is run by the Department of Health and Human Services.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so this is a study coming out from the government.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: So they released this study in 2014.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: But here's the order of events.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: The this court case actually began in 2017.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: There um there is this rule that there's a Toxic Substances Control Act, and that was of 1976.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it says that um like citizens can petition the EPA to assess and regulate chemicals that may pose a health risk.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a rule that's in place.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: It then says if the EPA denies the petition, the citizen group can challenge the decision in court.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: So what happened was in 2016, the fluoride action network actually filed a petition under this Toxic Substances Control Act, and they filed a petition to ban fluoride chemicals in water.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: The EPA denied it.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: So this led to the Fluoride Action Network and other advocacy and health groups like Food and Water Watch.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: It it basically led them to file a lawsuit in federal court in 2017.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: In June of 2020, there was a benchmark trial that took place over Zoom.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: It was intentionally delayed at this point to wait for this national toxicology program's review of fluoride's neurotoxicity.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so the judge wanted to wait until that study came out.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Now, what happened was in 2022, pro-fluoridation groups influenced the US Department of Health and Human Services to block the report from being released.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, like this is like a bad movie, right?
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: So literally the the so let's get this straight.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: The U.S.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: Department of Health and Human Services runs the National Toxicology Program.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: So the National Toxicology Program is coming up with this review study that's going to advise this judge, and the department that oversees them tries to block the report.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: So the plaintiffs exposed this interference.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then that resulted in some legal agreement that the report had to be released.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: So in early 2024, the trial did resume.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: The evidence linked fluoride exposure to lower IQ in children.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: So no wonder they tried to squash it, right?
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: What the study, the comprehensive review, excuse me, what it concluded was that higher levels of fluoride exposure, such as drinking water that contains 1.5 milligrams of fluoride per liter, is associated with lower IQ in children.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: So 1.5 milligrams of fluoride per liter.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: Now, let's give you some bearing on what this means.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: The EPA has set the maximum level for fluoride at 4 milligrams per liter.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: 4 milligrams per liter.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: This study is saying at levels of 1.5 milligrams, it can be associated with lower IQ in children.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: So there are already known health issues associated with consuming too much fluoride.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: And when I say these, so these are known health issues that are accepted by government and industry.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: That for instance, too much fluoride can cause skeletal fluorosis.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that's where fluoride builds up in the bones.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it can it can eventually result in pain, stiffness, and fractures in older adults.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: It can also cause dental fluorosis, where fluoride affects the teeth.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: It prevents the tooth enamel from forming properly, and it can cause tooth staining and pitting that they say is permanent.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so that's already known and accepted that that happens.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: And now what this study is saying is that oh no, at much lower levels than we thought, this fluoridation of the water can cause children's IQs to be lowered.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: The court case also revealed that they don't know how much the average American is exposed to in terms of fluoride, right?
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: It varies per county and per water source, right?
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so what they're saying is that the average exposure in America is probably somewhere around 0.7 milligrams per liter.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's lower than what the study claimed is associated with a lower IQ in children.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: But here's the thing: the judge said in this case that even that level of 0.7, in his opinion, poses, quote, unreasonable risk of reduced IQ in children.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: He basically went on to say that you can't say that the lower levels are safe because there has to be a clear margin, right?
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: There has to be a clear margin between exposure level and hazard level.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: And there's no clear margin, is what they're really getting at.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: So we don't actually know what level, if any, is actually safe.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: What's what's interesting to me is that most of us buy toothpaste, right?
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like I don't, you know, I make my own toothpaste.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: But a lot of people, most Americans buy toothpaste.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: And if you have toothpaste that has fluoride in it, chances are you can flip over that box and read the label.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: And most fluoride toothpaste will carry a warning on the package.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_01: And the warning says something like, keep out of reach of children under six years old.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: And you have to contact the poison control center if a significant amount is accidentally swallowed due to the potential danger of ingesting too much fluoride.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: So that's advertised on a lot of toothpaste labels, right?
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_01: So this is already known.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: And now we have this study that came out confirming this.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: The judge hindered a lot of the decision on it.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: There's some other studies just to highlight these.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to bore you with studies.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: We can link to them.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: A Harvard study came out in 2010 where they did a meta-analysis of 27 different studies.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: They also found a link between fluoride and cognitive decline in children.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: There was also a developmental fluoride neurotoxicity review in 2019.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: And this one also said that fluoride is a neurotoxicant that reduces measurable intelligence in humans.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: So it's toxic to the nerves.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: Most recently, on October 4th of this year, a Cochrane review came out.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you're not familiar with Cochrane reviews, uh, these are considered a gold standard in evidence-based healthcare.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: So these are gold standard reviews that they use.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: This review that came out on October 4th concluded that adding fluoride to drinking water may have fewer health benefits than was believed in the past.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: It concluded from a review of recent studies that the fluoride in the water is linked to only a slight reduction in tooth decay in children's baby teeth.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: So even they're questioning now the health benefits of it.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: And researchers are are and have been wondering the impact on developing babies, for instance, because oftentimes fluorinated water is used to make baby formula.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: And animal studies are showing that it can impair areas of the brain that are associated with not only learning and executive function, but memory.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so we have all of this new science that's coming out to say that this may not have been a good decision.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: So um, and by the way, just oh go ahead.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: See, just to just so that our everybody is on the same page with us, following us through.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, I'm gonna ask you um why they started putting it in, but B, uh to help everybody understand the fluoride has nothing to do with if the water is safe to drink.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: Fluoride does not take out microbes, it does not take out algae, it does not take out yuck, it doesn't make the water safer to drink.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, that would be things more like chlorine and and stuff like that.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: But but fluoride is simply an additive that was put in after the water is already safe to um you know to handle this.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: So why was fluorine fluoride put in in the first place?
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: Was it was it uh to get rid of to get rid of industrial uh in industrial waste or was it to actually make us healthy?
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it sounds like you already know the answer, Joel.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: This is in my first romp around the park.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, and by the way, I'll add, um, if any of our listeners are interested in us doing an entire podcast on the corruption and and history of fluoridation of water, drop us a line, you know, let us know, put it in the comment section, and we can go through the entire history of that.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I will just highlight a couple of big takeaways.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um so fluoridation began in the in the early 20th centuries, uh 20th century.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: What happened was researchers apparently, allegedly, observed that communities that had higher fluoride levels in their water naturally had lower rates of tooth decay.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: That led to a hypothesis that fluoride could help prevent cavities.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: So in 1945, Grand Rapids, Michigan became the first city to add fluoride to its public water supply.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: It was an experiment, and they were supposed to be a control city as well.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: That did not happen.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, they did not complete the experiment.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_01: They actually started giving the control group, the control city, um fluoridated water as well.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: And by 1962, the government began recommending the public water supply contain fluoride to help prevent tooth decay.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: After that, water fluoridation became a common public health practice in the United States.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: I should add, it's not a federal mandate, right?
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: So different cities can decide if they want to have fluoride in their drinking water.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: And some cities have actually pushed back.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, just in February of this year, Collier County and Florida voted to no longer add fluoride to their county's uh water supply.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: So counties do this is a this is an issue where you can make a difference on your local level.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: They did it in Collier County and others.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: So what happened?
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um so so that this will this will sum up, hopefully for you, why this has become so rampant in our what in our drinking water.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: Fluoride that's added to the drinking water doesn't come from a pharmaceutical grade fluoride.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_01: All right, that's too expensive.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: It typically comes from three main sources sodium fluoride, sodium fluorosilicate, and fluorosylic acid.
• 17:24
  unknown: Right?
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: The fluoral, the fluorosilic um the fluoryl silicic acid.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's I mean, I mean I'm having a hard time saying these.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's the most widely used agent today.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: All of these are actually byproducts from industrial processes.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: So, for instance, that's a byproduct from phosphate fertilizer manufacturing.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so they manufacture these fertilizers and then they have phosphate left over.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's a toxic, it can be a toxic byproduct.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: And in and in in truth, it was actually making local livestock sick at these um factories where they were producing these, um, this this phosphate fertilizer.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: So they uh, you know, I according to the reports, they initially tried to dump dump it in the rivers, right?
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: And then they were told to stop because it's an industrial waste product.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so they had to figure out something to do with it.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: So they basically processed it and recycled it into this fluoride.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: They captured it, processed it, and repurposed it to put it into our water.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's actually been dubbed the worst recycling program in the entire world when you take a hazardous waste product from the phosphate industry and dump it into the public drinking water.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: So they can't dump it into the international waterways and they can't dump it locally because, like I said, it kills the it hurts the livestock.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: So they gave it to us.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: That's the and and so so the you know, behind the closed doors, imagine, you know, the the big industrial interests, uh, whining and dining uh officials behind closed doors as the as the chemical fertilizer industry took off, you know, their post-World War II.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, it was it was here, but it wasn't nearly as big.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: Post-World War II chemical fertilizer really took off.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and that that's where a lot of these uh toxic byproducts, you know, um became so uh so much in volume that they became a real problem.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they had to figure out somewhere to put them.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: And um so to add on to what you're saying, when the decision was made by the federal government to endorse the public water fluoridation, it was actually under the leadership of a man named Oscar Ewing.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: I think I'm pronouncing that right, E-W-I-N-G, Oscar Ewing.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: So he was a longtime lawyer for the aluminum company of America, right?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: So that's another industry where the byproducts can be turned into the fluoride that's stuck in the water.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: So he was a longtime lawyer for the Aluminum Company of America, and he was the company's top legal liaison with the federal government.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: And that was before he was then selected in 1947 to head the federal security agency.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: He later then became um oh, that agency is now the Department of Health and Human Services.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so once again, you've got people going from industry over into government, and just totally by coincidence, these policies get passed once they're in government, right?
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: So so that that did help to push it back then.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and just so everybody knows what aluminum corporation of America, it's often known as Alcoa.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's the the company Alcoa.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: So just I don't want to lose anybody here in the you know, in the in the specificity of the you know, whatever, the jargon.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's right.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: And right around that same time, Joel, when they decided to put this in our this this chemical toxic byproduct into our drinking water, in the 19 uh up until the 1950s, fluoride was actually used by doctors in Europe and South America.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: Can you guess why they used it?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: Hmm.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: To reduce thyroid function in patients who had overactive thyroid glands.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: So even so.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: When we're talking about you know how many people have thyroid issues these days?
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my the thousands and thousands of people, especially, especially women.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I mean, that's you it's ubiquitous.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's ubiquitous in the culture.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and fatigue is one of the top symptoms and complaints of all Americans, fatigue, right?
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm not saying, oh, this fluorine in the water directly caused this, right?
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not saying that.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: But what I am saying is that it has been known, even back then, when they decided to put it in our water, it was known that it would slow down thyroid function.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: Even back then, they knew that doses of two to five milligrams per day was enough to lower thyroid function in their patients.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's a similar amount to what some Americans consume through the fluoridated uh drinking water.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we also know that, uh, and I bring this one up because I hear a lot of times people feel like they're disconnected, you know, disconnected from people, from other people, even when they're surrounded by people, they just feel like they can't, they don't have community, like they feel alone, right?
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Isolated.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I hear a lot of people also talking about how they feel disconnected from God and they wish they could be closer to God.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we've known at least since 1997, that the penial gland is where one of the one of the places in your body where fluoride can accumulate.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the penial gland helps you with connectivity and and it it is said to help you connect, for instance, with God, you know, and like with with nature, for instance.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: And we know that fluoride can actually accumulate in the pineal gland, uh, along with we know it can accumulate in bones and in joints.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the list goes on.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: It can be uh too much fluoride exposure can also be linked to migraines.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's a whole there's a whole list here.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, one thing I thought was interesting, I wanted to share this, is that um, oh, by the way, did I mention that even if you're on a private well, you can still have um water that's contaminated with fluoride.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: So there's natural, natural fluoride, right, that's in rocks and such.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: And um that can be in well water, and that's usually at very low levels.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: I the if my memory serves me correctly, it's like somewhere around 0.05 milligrams usually.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's a low level.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: But fluoride can also enter the groundwater from discharge during industrial activities, so like the mining processes, for example.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: So it's often recommended that every couple of years you actually have your well water tested for fluoride.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so don't just think because you're on a well, it just doesn't apply to you.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it could potentially apply to everybody who drinks water.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: So a while ago, I was studying fluoride.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, go ahead, Joel.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, uh, and how about if somebody is uh if a farmer is applying uh chemical uh chemical phosphorus um NPK chemical fertilizers, would there be fluoride residue in there since it's such a part of the manufacturing of it?
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: So there are some pesticides that have fluoride in them, so it it can and um get on the food.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um there's some packaging, food packaging that contains fluoride.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, you know, you can get it in toothpaste, you can get it in mouthwash, the dentist puts it on your teeth.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, some dentists it's also in some prescription drugs.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: So it was in Fenfen, Prozac.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: Almost all psychoactive drugs um are fluorinated drugs.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so so you can also be ingesting it there.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, one of the reasons why it leads to um issues with thyroid is because it competes with iodine.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_01: So that's that's a problem as well.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: So sometimes they recommend that if you're consuming these prescription drugs that have fluoride in them, that you also consume iodine, but of course speak to your doctor about that, you know, before you start doing that.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you want to be tested to see if you have adequate levels of iodine in the body.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, so it's it's in a lot of different uh places.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: It could be in bottled water.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: So we know sometimes bottled water is actually just tap water, right?
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's added to bottled water.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um, in our country, that's not listed on the label.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: In some other countries, they actually do list that, like how much fluoride's in the water.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it could be in carbonated beverages.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: So any anything you order or purchase where they've added water.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: So beer, soda, fruit juices, like the ready-to-drink juices and drinks, um, any of these things that they add water to, um, wine, um, it doesn't mean that they're using municipal or tap water.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: They might have a reverse osmosis filter on there to get it out.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, I would default to that they probably don't unless they're advertising it, but you can also call the company if if you know, if you're interested in knowing the level.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, other things too, like so there's a study that that measured fluoride in foods, and they saw it in everything from frozen meals, lunch meat to baked goods to breads, crackers, soups, salad dressing, ice pops, um, precooked vegetables, right?
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: Because they're cooked, they're cooking them in the water.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um, instant teas, uh powders, like those powders that you can mix instant teas with, even if it's unsweetened.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, tuna, uh, crab meat.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: So so you've got uh some naturally occurring, and then you also have some that has been concentrated in foods from the way that we process the foods and also possibly package the foods.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so we so there's a lot of exposure.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: And and this is one thing that's not looked at is the cumulative exposure of fluoride.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's not just in drinking water, right?
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's in drinking water, uh, the majority of drinking water, but it's also in some of the foods now.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's also in, like I said, the toothpaste, mouthwashes, the dentist will paint it on your teeth.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: So we're getting this cumulative exposure, at least most of us are.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: And nobody has really done the long-term studies on this.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: And the level, the EPA's recommended safety level, in my understanding, was not adjusted once all these other sources came out.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: So once fluoride started being added to toothpaste, mouthwashes, now you have fluoride tabs.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: I know some people, some mothers that would add fluoride tabs to the drinking water of their babies, like, you know, in the in the bottle.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: So because we've been fed this lime, that this is what you need, and it's not an essential nutrient.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_01: There's been a lot of studies done on this about how if somebody doesn't have any fluoride, there's there there isn't an association with any negative health effects from not having the fluoride in the body.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, nobody nutrients.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, nobody, nobody is sick or has a malady due to being fluoride deficient.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: At least not what we can find, you know, like none of us can actually find that yet.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, there if fluoride is naturally present, like I said, in some water, but at a very low level.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: So it's possible that at a very low level it might do something, because why else would God put that there?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: But certainly it's not naturally found at these really high levels that we're undergoing.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so anyway, um, one thing I wanted to share was when I was studying fluoride uh several months ago, and believe me, I went into this real deep dive on the corruption in each individual department, on what their involvement was, and it's across the board.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: So, like I said, listeners, if you're interested, let us know.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: We can go through that.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_01: But what I found was this um kids' book, it's called FS4 fluoride.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I don't know if you ever experienced Joel this with your kids and your grandkids, that oftentimes your kids may believe somebody else more than you, like they want to hear it from somebody else.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like, yeah, yeah.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: My kids will do this to me sometimes.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: And and I think, you know what, part of me is like the ego part of me is like, why don't you just believe me?
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: I'm telling you this, right?
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: And then the the mom part of me, the libertarian part of me is like, good, you should question with boldness.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: Question everyone, right?
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I got this little book for them, and it's called F is for fluoride, a feasible fairy tale for free thinkers, 15 and up.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, that's my kind of book, right?
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I um, and I'm not gonna read this whole book to you, but I wanted to just read the first part of it, and I will tell you, it is actually referenced.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, in the back of this book, they referenced the studies, um, and where they got these quotes from different government industry leaders and whatnot.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a kid's book like I've never seen before.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm just gonna read you this first part of it, okay?
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, it says, once upon a time, in a world weary from war, right?
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Because we're talking about the 1950s here.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: Fluoride flooded into the atmosphere from factories galore.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: It was a leading air pollutant, leaving lawsuits in its wake till corporate lawyers banded together.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: They knew what was at stake.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: They founded institutes and research labs and quote, helped direct their work.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_01: Sure, the science all supported fluoride, but that was just a perk.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: Dentists who endorsed it moved up and up and up, while dissenters who dissented were kicked out of the club.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: When a national dentist institute was formed, they knew just the man to direct the new federal agency and carry out their plan.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks to his infatuation with water fluoridation.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_01: He began the first trial three years before.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: Two years later, the government declared fluoride safe and effective for everyone forevermore.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then it goes in, it literally goes into the history behind it and like health issues they found with the references.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: So you can go and look at original sources.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_01: But I thought, this is just a great idea.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like someone's educating the kids and giving them original sources.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_01: Like, don't trust me, go to this original source and find out why this is in your water and make the decision for yourself.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_01: Do you want to actually consume that or not?
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that great?
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and it even rhymes.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's what's really cool about it.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: There's uh it's it's got it's got a rhyming uh a lilt to it.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: So that's pretty cool.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that that's that's great.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: So so um we're about out of time.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh um, what so I I I don't think I think we're preaching to the choir here.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think I don't think we're gonna get much pushback, Cena.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: On, you know, we're not gonna get nasty there saying, oh, what's the matter with you guys, you know, complaining about fluoride.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: I think most of our listeners probably already knew this.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now it's just been bolstered.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe what we can give our listeners is, okay, this is another another drip on your head.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: If you're in a public in a public drinking water situation, what should you do?
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: Besides not buy as one of Theresa and I's pet peeves, is the amount of money and energy spent buying bottled water.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, oh my, come on, give me a break.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: As if, as if you know, coke isn't bad enough, then you, you know, then you have to buy bottled water.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so so what's the what's the best, uh, easiest, most doable um workaround for you know for the for the average person that's on a that's on a municipal system?
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so I love this.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_01: I got some solutions here for you uh on different levels.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: So you can reduce exposure and you can actually detoxify the body from fluoride.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, some say you can't detoxify it, but I don't think that's true.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_01: You just have to have your detox systems um flowing uh efficiently.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_01: So the first is water filtration.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: You can use reverse osmosis to reduce uh the fluoride level in drinking water.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_01: So it's not it's not 100%, but um some companies have data showing that it's pretty high.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: So reverse osmosis can use it, uh can can remove most of it from the drinking water.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, don't drink from bottled water unless you trust the source.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because like I said, it could just be municipal water, and sometimes they might add um fluoride.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_01: Find out your own levels in your water if you have a well.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you can get it tested.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, oftentimes there's local um companies that will test your water for fluoride.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: And you can also call your um your county and and you know, find out the number for the water processing plant.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_01: And you can even ask them.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes they'll tell you uh like when you know the fluoride level and the so they'll often do like flushes of different chemicals.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if you've ever drank municipal water, Joel, but you can taste the difference.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: It changes because they'll do flushes.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: So you can find out if they'll let you know um their schedule.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um you can support your body for your body's detoxification by consuming um tamarind.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: T A M A R I N D, tamarind.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's often you know used in some cuisines, like it's added to some food cuisines, but you can actually consume it and it will pull uh fluoride out of the body.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: Foods that are rich in calcium and magnesium and vitamin C can also support uh the natural detox process.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, a vitamin C flush can help support that detox process as well.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: And then, of course, if you are trying to avoid fluoride, you would also want to avoid the dental products that contain fluoride, the toothpaste, the mouthwashes, and having the dentist paint fluoride on your teeth.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: So those are some um some quick takeaways.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's uh that's a really good um, a really good kind of bulleted list.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: Our question, I'd say, we've got a question here for the day.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I would suggest that the question could be if you are on a municipal system, do you know if they add fluoride?
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know?
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: And um I'm I'm I'm blessed to be on a well out here in the middle of nowhere's land.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we're it we're in uh we've had our well tested numerous times over the years.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um we're in pretty good shape.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but um people want to municipal I I really feel, I mean, I when I when I go through the I mean I travel a lot, so you know, going through the airport and stuff, I just I drink from the water fountain because I know I I you know I gotta have some water.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: I I come back from every single trip.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_00: It takes me about one and a half days to rehydrate because I just hate drinking the water.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: A, it tastes terrible, and B, I know it might not be the best for me.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: So I like I drink just because I have to, but uh not because I want to.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're on a municipal system, do you know if they're adding fluoride?
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's a that's a nice first little action step that you can do today, just with a phone call, and at least you'll be that then you can make a decision.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: You can decide what you how you want to proceed from there.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: So Cena, thanks for thanks for uh giving us the uh uh uh enlightenment here and closing on a real positive note of not only detox, but um, but you know, some of the things that you can do yourself.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: And because this stuff is ubiquitous and it it came, you know, it came along with so many other things right there, post-World War II, that um the whole industrial uh chemical whatever, you know, uh penetration of our of our lives, of our bodies really took a took a giant leap forward, well, or backward um there post-World War II.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: So thanks for bringing this to our attention and um we'll it'll be interesting to see what this federal judge's ruling actually does it do anything, does it carry any clout?
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what what will happen?
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh because there's a whole lot of there's a whole lot of hands in the um in the cookie jar on this one, and a lot of reputations and a lot of uh government bulletins and assumed, you know, um uh credentialed expert advice.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_00: So thanks for bringing it to our attention.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you all for spending another uh half hour with us on the Beyond Labels podcast, and we look forward to visiting with you next week.