Wesley Shaw
2/11/2012
In our short lifetime, we have seen a huge increase in prescription drug abuse, prescription drug deaths, and more harmful side effects from new drugs that are being constantly created and revised. Using prescription drugs is considered to be a norm, but there are more negative side effects to most drugs than positive ones(skin irritation, mood swings, vomiting, or even death). I mostly want to focus on a newer issue that has had increased criticism.
Fluoride for example has been used in our drinking water for over fifty years. Fluoride is the stuff that comes in most adult tooth pastes, as well as drinking water and is used to help prevent tooth decay and eliminate cavity forming bacteria. Before fluoride was deemed a cavity fighter, it was used in rat poison and insecticide. Fluoride is actually a bi-product from the manufacturing of copper and iron. People could not legally dispose of it until a study in the 1930s concluded that fluoride prevented tooth decay. In reality, there are more possible harmful side effects than there are positive effects. More recent studies have concluded that in fact too much fluoride leads to the brains increased ability to absorb aluminum. This is typically found in… Alzheimers patients. In addition, fluoride is typically not recommended at high doses for young children because it is leading to decreased brain function and development.
Most people would say that this is just another conspiracy theory. Well I don’t really care if it is or not. It is an issue, like many natural resource management issues, that may take a long time to resolve. For those of you who don’t already know, fluoride is put into most public water systems, mostly so that the government can regulate pearly white shiny teeth. Bone cancer patients have been linked to areas with high fluoridation in their water. People need to have the choice not to use fluoridated water.
People have begun to bust the fluoride myth, and natural dentists are saying fluoride hardly effects your teeth anyway. They say the brush alone will keep your teeth clean, and that the amount of fluoride you drink in water is plenty enough.
Fluoride is just a good example of a inorganic chemical that has been used for a long time, but as new research arises, it is considered dangerous. A safe way to avoid problems like this is to use natural medications and remedies for any kind of ailments such as cold symptoms, allergies, depression and anxiety, and even cancer. Aromatherapy and natural oils are a great example.
Therapeutic grade oils such as Balsam fir for one example has an array of uses. It is used to treat lung and sinus infections as well as arthritis, scoliosis and urinary tract infections. Most of you have heard of the tea tree oil, which is active in higher end hair products used to fight lice mites and scabies. More recent studies show that application of tea tree oil is more effective than permethrin, which is the pharmaceutical alternative.
The oil of Sugar pine is being studied as we speak as a rich source of vitamin C. Castor bean oil is used to increase immune system efficiency.
I believe that one of the largest problems revolving around the use of natural medicines are the pharmaceutical companies. Take a cure for cancer as a good example. If they released a cure for cancer, pharmaceutical companies would not be making their fair share. Most of their revenue comes from treatments. On an even larger scale, if pharmaceutical companies began releasing natural remedies for simple ailments like the common cold, arthritis, allergies, etc., they would not be in business at all.
Natural remedies should be considered the next time you think something is wrong with you. In conclusion after finding out effects of fluoride, I am inclined to say that there is most likely grounds to believe that most of the other medication you use could theoretically be harmful.
3 comments:
Very interesting. I never knew that Flouride had so many negatives for just the one positive of protecting our teeth. I agree that there are way more natural cures for things that we could use to replace pharmaceuticals.
I'm in agreement. Listening to ads for medications with far more scary side effects than positive claims, makes me worry!
I agree with you that there are natural remedies out there and they should be used if applicable. But I feel that these natural remedies are good as a preventative measure but if a get seriously ill I won't hesitate to go get a prescription. My sister in law is going to grad school for Naturalpathic medicine so I have heard of all the good out there surrounding this topic.
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