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UK Against Fluoridation

Friday, July 29, 2011

USA - Study finds no link between fluoride and osteosarcoma

Study finds no link between fluoride and osteosarcoma
By Kathy Kincade, Editor in Chief
July 28, 2011 -- There is no significant association between bone fluoride levels and osteosarcoma risk, according to a new study in the Journal of Dental Research (July 28, 2011).

There has been ongoing controversy as to whether there is a link between bone fluoride levels and osteosarcoma. An inconclusive animal study conducted 20 years ago first raised the question of an association between fluoride and osteosarcoma. Since that time, other studies have examined the issue; however, this new study, using actual bone to measure fluoride levels in individuals with and without osteosarcoma, is considered by researchers to be the best science to date because a more accurate and reliable scientific method was used to measure exposure from all sources of fluoride, according to Raymond Gist, DDS, president of the ADA.

"This new study adds to an already strong base of scientific evidence that fluoride is safe and effective at preventing cavities," Dr. Gist stated in a press release.

A team of researchers from Harvard University, the Medical College of Georgia and the National Cancer Institute analyzed hundreds of bone samples from nine hospitals over an eight-year period from patients with osteosarcoma and a control group to measure fluoride levels in the bone. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) approved the design of the study, which was led by Chester Douglass, DMD, PhD, of Harvard University, and funding for the research was provided by the NCI, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research..............

7/28/2011 1:57:28 PM
nyscof This study took 8 years to compile the data and 7 years to tweak the data to desired results, in my opinion. It is meant to refute the Harvard/Bassin study which showed a correlation between osteosarcoma and bone cancer. But it does not. Chester Douglass author of the study you write about signed off on Bassin's dissertation which became a published peer-reviewed study.
Since Bassin found that it was the timing of F exposure and neither the bone level of fluoride nor the length of exposure which could account for the dramatic increase in osteosarcoma, this study actually adds nothing new to the issue.

Interesting that Douglass and his team used "other malignant bone tumors" as the control group, instead of true controls. And the control group was higher in age and therefore had higher bone fluoride levels.

Bassin found 5 - 7 fold increase risk in osteosarcoma in young boys exposed in the 6th, 7th and 8th years. Bone levels collected at autopsy or diagnosis cannot possibly give the exposure during these years ( bone fluoride levels are cumulative)

For five years this promised study has been used to discount Bassin's findings - now that it has come out clearly it does not. Why didn't they replicate Bassin's methodology?

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