Skeptic's Alert: Another Community of Crazies (Old News)
I ran across this post at Freakonomics the other day:
[My dentist] told me that tooth decay in general, even among wealthy patients, is getting worse and worse, particularly for people in middle age and above. The reason? An increased reliance on medications for heart disease, high cholesterol, depression, etc. Many of these medications, Dr. Reiss explained, produce drymouth, which is caused by a constricted salivary flow; because saliva kills bacteria in the mouth, a lack of it means increased bacteria, which leads to increased tooth decay. Given the choice of taking these medicines versus having some tooth decay, I’m sure most people would still choose the medicines—but I am guessing that most people haven’t thought about the link between the two.followed by this in the comments:
The dentist's comments are a classic example of anecdotal beliefs espoused by many healthcare professionals to their patients without the backing of evidence-based medicine; i.e. clinical trials. If Dr. Reiss could back up his assertions with some evidence I would be more prone to believe them. And in case you are wondering, my skepticism arises from his broad claim that most medications used to treat modern chronic medical conditions cause dry mouth. Many medications do cause dry mouth, but of the ones I know that are used for today’s most common conditions, none of them stand out as particulary drying to the oral cavity. Furthermore, there is an alternative explanation that seems to me to more closely follow Occam's Razor, an explanation I might add that is popular among many other dentists. The increase in tooth decay seen in modern times can be linked to the increased popularity and pursuant consumption of bottled water, the nonfluorinated cousin of regular tap water. And of course we know that one of the greatest things you can do for your teeth is consume adequate amounts of fluoride. Go figure.A little further along there was this:
I thought if a child ate enough toothpaste, he’d die of fluorosis – is this urban myth?Dino to the rescue! (Someone else beat me to it, though.) I was researching an answer to the effect that no, fluorosis was a cosmetic discoloration of the tooth enamel (but the author may have been thinking, correctly, of the danger to children from mouthwash with high alcohol content) but in the process of finding links to document my comments, found this:
The Fluoride Action Network: A group vehemently opposed to the poor little halide.
Minimal googling on my part, though, came up with these reassurances that while I've been off nibbling the tops of the trees and losing the name Brontosaurus, nothing has changed. Just the tip of what I found:
CDC Fluoridation Home Page
Surgeon General 2004
Why Fluoridation is Important (QuackWatch)
American Dental Association
World Health Organization
In fact, Quackwatch has that very same Fluoride Action Network on their NOT RECOMMENDED list of information sources. I suppose I'm only just stumbling across this nonsense now because I'm the new kid on the block. Have people like Dr. Bartram, Flea and the Woo-Meister already demolished these pretenders before I got here, and/or is it time for more exposure?