Fluoride in Water and 5 Other Terrifying Places it’s Hiding

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What is Fluoride, and Why is it Important?

We’ve all heard of it before, right? Fluoride. That stuff that the dentist uses to basically atom bomb the germs in your mouth. Some of us, may have even heard that you can find fluoride in water (Thank you Water Filters!). If you’re like any of my friends, you may have shown 10 minutes of concern before heading back to the tap. But, what most of us don’t realize, is that Fluoride actually hangs out in more places than just your water supply. Now, here’s the “get real angry” part…Fluoride is pretty tricky to get out of our water. The worst part, is that our government (in most cases in the US) is actually voluntarily dumping it into our water supply. Now THAT is something worth getting upset about.

The Shocking Fluoride Hang Outs!

1. Hiding in Baby Food!

That’s right, you can find Fluoride, which studies have shown can cause brain damage can be found in infant food. Why? Because food processing today is a fluoride filled process.

For example, deboned chicken has actually shown to contain traces of Fluoride due to the process used to actually debone them. “A single serving (71 g) of infant food made with [mechanically separated] chicken would provide as much as 0.6 mg of fluoride, which is twice the [Adequate Intake] and 87% of the [Upper Limit of Safety] for fluoride for a 6-month-old infant. For a one-year-old toddler, a single serving (71 g) of chicken sticks would provide 0.4 mg of fluoride, which would nearly match the [Adequate Intake] and provide about half of the [Upper Limit of Safety] for fluoride. One serving (71 g) of luncheon meat containing mechanically separated chicken could provide as much as 0.45 mg of fluoride for a child. A desirable level of fluoride intake could therefore be exceeded on a recurring basis when combined with other sources of fluoride intake such as fluoridated water, foods made with fluoridated water, and swallowing of fluoridated toothpaste.” SOURCE: Fein NJ, Cerklewski FL. (2001). Fluoride content of foods made with mechanically separated chicken. Journal of Agricultural Food Chemistry 49(9):4284-6. – Courtesy of Fluoride Alert

2. In Your Chicken Patties, Chicken Nuggets, and Chicken Byproducts.

So, in number one we talked briefly about how the de-boning process causes fluoride to get into Chicken. But if you take into consideration all of the chicken byproducts we buy and probably more alarmingly, feed our kids, this becomes a much bigger issue.

3. In Your Juice

From fruit juice to Gatorade, this sugary drink isn’t just being called out for it’s sugar content anymore. Now, moms have a whole other reason to remove this “sweet spot” from kids’ diets. Juices have been shown to have 0.05 to 2.8 PPM of fluoride per serving.

4. In Your Cereal!

Is anyone else as creeped out as I am at how many of the things on this list are things we give to our kids? I mean, some studies show that cereal produced in fluoridated areas (aka, most of the US) contain as much as 3.8 to 6.3PPM.

5. In Your BEER

Okay, so this is less scandalous than in baby food, but according to “FFBeers” some beers have as much as 1PPM in them. That’s unusually high. Now times that by the 15 beers you may or may not be drinking during a weekend on the beach, and you’ve got quite a bit of fluoride swimming through you.

What to do About Flouride in Your Water

It’s clear at this point, that there is need to be justifiably concerned with fluoride in water, as well as a whole host of other places we’ve outlined for you. The only question that remains is what to do about fluoride in your water. Luckily, there are steps that can be taken to change the way this chemical impacts your family.

Minimizing Fluoride Exposure in the Home

You can impact this major problem in two ways and dramatically minimize the danger of fluoride. The first way to minimize exposure is in your personal and home life. You can minimize your personal exposure, as well as your family’s exposure. You can do this in the following ways:

  • Avoid Fluoridated Water: This is the most impactful as well as one of the simplist ways to reduce your exposure to fluoride. You can find out more about your options by an article on Learning to Reduce Exposure to Fluoride.
  • Eat more Fresh, Organic Food: I wish that I could tell you that there was a way to avoid this toxin without avoiding processed foods, unfortunately, that is simply not the case. If you want to avoid fluoride, you need to cut out as much processed food as possible and stick to whole, nature-grown organics.
  • Avoid Mechanically De-Boned Chicken: As mentioned earlier in the article, this process has a lot to do with your consumption. Make sure you’re mindful of the way your food is prepared at all times to help minimize your risk of exposure. 

 

Taking a Political and Environmental Stand on Fluoride

You can make another really significant impact by speaking out against fluoride in your water supply. You can do this by writing letters and making phone calls to your local officials about your personal concern with yourself, your family, and your children being exposed to fluoride. More importantly, you can spread the word. The more of us complaining about Fluoride to our officials, the more of an impact we make collectively as a whole. Make sure that you get anyone you can on board, and let’s stop the government’s poisoning of our water supply. 

Amanda Little
I'm Amanda and I'm a 22 year old mother who's been diagnosed with PCOS. I'm passionate about health and wellness and aim to make a difference however I can. I also blog over at my site, HealthyHerLiving.