Sometimes I really don't know which way to turn. Some say fluoride is bad for you but they fail to identify what to use in its place to keep your teeth hard and keep more of them in your mouth.
At least MD and ND, Dr. Carolyn Dean spells out the problems with fluoride as opposed to way too many pseudo-health writers who come up short on a true understanding of the best nutrients for dental health. Too many narcissists on Twitter rely on poetic memes and clever phrases but leave you absolutely empty-handed and empty headed with zero recommendations. It's like they've become gurus by way of memes. Healthbot, however, is not one of these. He's quite good. His tweets are sharp and to he point and incontrovertible.
I like Healthbot @healthbot. He tweets out some basic facts that we all need to heed and get back to.
Like this.
That's good intel. It's Twitter intel and we all understand that it has limited value. But it is better than nothing. It's a start for deeper understanding.
But when it comes to tweets on fluoride, all that we get is that same old demonizing narrative, perhaps well deserved, about fluoride hazards and how the chemical is a neurotoxin, how it leads to dementia, and a host of other ailments, but he leaves us wanting for alternatives to fluoride that would harden our teeth, fortify and preserve tooth pulp, gums, and other anatomical structures of our smile and bite.
Yeah, this ain't good.
So good info. on fluoride. In fact, of all the folks or any of the folks who delineate the hazards of fluoride, Healthbot may be the best. Hard to ignore the value of that service.
But no word on how to keep more healthy teeth in your mouth. No word on how to prevent teeth from cracking, and so forth. I get it. He's not a dentist. But nor can dentists provide insights for you either, except to have you schedule another appointment two weeks from now.
Nutritional researcher, Bill Sardi, has written in how vitamin D hardens tooth enamel and how far-soluble vitamin A restores tooth pulp. So there. You've got two items that you didn't have before that can be effective. To what degree of preservation and restoration these compounds deliver results depends in a host if factors: age, diet, disease, injuries, and others, including genetics. But at least he gives you a place to start. Further, when I wrote to him directly asking about how to strengthen teeth topically, he said, without hesitation, fluoride. So fluoride plays a role, but there are trade-offs, and maybe that is all we can hope for. And that folks with beautiful teeth are simply winners on the genetic lottery.
But a lot can go wrong with the mouth, the anatomical orifice occupying the lower half of our face.
MD and ND, Dr. Carolyn Dean to the rescue.
FLUORIDE IS A POISON
Fluoride is not added to drinking water to clean it or make it healthier but to prevent cavities by making the enamel of your teeth stronger. In the past decade, all the pro-fluoride research has scientifically validated this fact. But they totally ignore the other effects of fluoride – up to and including cancer. Some websites even call fluoride a superhero!
Let me take a few minutes to outline the problems with fluoride. The enamel of the tooth binds to fluorine creating a whole new compound called fluoroapatite. Instead of being beneficial to teeth, accumulated evidence shows that fluoride during infancy and early childhood may damage the developing tooth-forming cells and lead to defective enamel referred to as “dental fluorosis.”
This condition is characterized by white, yellow, and brown spots and/or pitted permanent teeth. But you don’t even know that in infants until their teeth have erupted through the gumline. By then it’s too late to do anything about it.
Fluorosis has been acknowledged by the ADA, which recommends that parents not use fluoridated water for children under 6 months (including water used to make up baby formula bottles) and to avoid fluoridated toothpaste for children two years and younger. For older children, the ADA advises that only a pea-sized amount of fluoride toothpaste should be used. And that kids should be taught to spit out rather than swallow toothpaste! But they added sweeteners and flavors that make toothpaste very tasty. And, of course, chemicals are absorbed through the mucus membranes of the mouth.
She recommends that you don't use Listerine. Oh, boy, here we go again . . . a list of don'ts without compensating list of musts.
AVOID ALCOHOL-LACED MOUTHWASH
Take the most popular antiseptic throat gargle on the market – actually, don’t take it – avoid it like the plague. I don’t even have to name it, you all know from the relentless advertising that tells us we all have bad breath and aren’t fit to face our friends and family without this product.
The total amount of active ingredients in Listerine is: 0.258%. Those ingredients are Oils of Thyme, Eucalyptus, Wintergreen and Menthol. The inactive ingredients are Water, Alcohol (21.6%), Sorbitol Solution, Flavoring, Poloxamer 407, Benzoic Acid, Sodium Saccharin, Sodium Benzoate, FD&C Green 3 making Listerine a 50-proof alcohol product!
Okay, this was interesting. So if you're using and consuming fluoride, you're depleting your body and bones of magnesium. Wow.
FLUORIDE KILLS MAGNESIUM
While most of Europe and half of the United States have completely abandoned the use of fluoride in the water supply, it still remains in the other half of the United States, in toothpaste, and as a molecule in SSRI antidepressants such as Prozac. Fluoride seeks out minerals such as magnesium and binds with it, making magnesium unavailable to the body and unable to do its work. The magnesium fluoride mineral produced is called sellaite; it is almost insoluble and ends up taking the place of magnesium in hard tissues like bone and cartilage, but its brittleness makes the bone susceptible to fracture. The reduction in available magnesium causes a decrease in enzymatic action in the body.”
This is devastating. Just think how many people have either been on Prozac or some other antidepressant and each day that they take it magnesium is either blocked or depleted. The horrible irony is that supplementing with magnesium is the first line if defense one would take to overcome any varying firms if depression.
FLUORIDATED DRUGS, I.E., ANTIDEPRESSANTS, DEPLETE MAGNESIUM
A little-known fact is that there are 15 classes of drugs and thus hundreds of prescription drugs using fluoride as an active ingredient. In the above section, I mention that Prozac contains fluoride, which means that Prozac depletes magnesium every day that you take it. And if you’ve read my Magnesium Miracle book you know that magnesium deficiency causes anxiety and depression.
Whether natural or synthetic fluoride from industrial waste, fluoride does not simply wash out from the surface of your teeth or from the recesses of your gums. Dr. Dean says that fluoride gets immediately absorbed through the mucus membrane of your mouth.
She notes that titanium dioxide is in all-white toothpaste, adding that she's still out on its toxicity against its effectiveness. A quick search raises a red flag.
Nutritionally speaking, she cites collagen-producing vitamin C as the key nutrient for protecting your teeth. I take vitamin C every day but my gums still need work. Sections are not too healthy. Maybe adding Hyaluronic Acid would help the cause.
