Minister ordered HRB Fluoride Review after Sinn Fein Bill won Cross Party Support
for www.thejournalist.ie
Health Minister James Reilly told the Dail on Wednesday, November 8th that he asked the Health Service Executive to order a full scientific review of whether compulsory water fluoridation should be ended, after a Sinn Féin bill to outlaw water fluoridation in Ireland drew cross-party support from parties on the Left.
Studies have linked fluorides in water to higher rates of bone cancer, asthma, osteoporosis and to thyroid illness.
With a vote to take place on Tuesday, 12th November, the Government announced a U Turn on its previous water policy.The HRB review is now due to report in December this year. It has been told to look at how fluorides affects many vulnerable groups who have not previously been the subject of fluoride impact studies.
Ireland is one of only three countries in the world which still has a national policy compelling water fluoridation. Most European countries have banned it (like the Netherlands), or abandoned it after scientific studies identified it as a high risk activity which can affect the brain and bone development of young children.
One political party that has no doubt about the health impacts of fluorides is Sinn Féin. The party’s Environmental Spokesman is Louth TD Brian Stanley, whose mother died from thyroid illness. Fluorides in water impair the thyroid gland’s ability to absorb the iodine it needs to make thyroid hormones.
Stanley‘s bill sought to make water fluoridation in the Republic a criminal offence.
Meanwhile a group of brave men and women from across Ireland have posed for a nude calendar to fund a Supreme Court case to make the Government end its archaic and risky mandatory fluoride policy. The Naked Fluoride Calendar 2014 being sold by @fluoridegirl Aisling Fitzgibbon will fund a court case to make the Government end Ireland’s 50-year-old policy of mandatory water fluoridation in 2014.
Forced Fluoridation of Irish water began in Ireland in 1964, after Gladys Ryan, a Dublin Mother-of-five, lost a six-week Supreme Court battle to prevent it. Gladys was represented in court by Amnesty Founder Sean McBride and by former Fine Gael Minister Richie Ryan.
Campaigners believe the health benefits of ending fluoridation here would be enormous. Banning fluoridation would also save us money - a minimum of 4.5M Euro per annum. This could be used to upgrade Ireland’s creaking Victorian water supply system. Problems with Dublin’s water recently resulted in a million people being cut off and unable to flush the loo or brush their teeth between 8pm and 8am for almost a week.
The Calendar Boys and Girls joined their ringleader, nutritionist Aisling Fitzgibbon, 27, from Kerry, at the White Lady art gallery on Dublin’s Fitzwilliam Quay, to launch the 2014 Calendar and party with DJs and journalists from Hot Press, the music magazine which has supported the 50- year battle.
The Naked Fluoride Calendar 2014 is on sale for 9.99 euro from www.thegirlagainstfluoride.com.
Ivan Yates promised his party would end water fluoridation if it was re-elected, way back in 2001, but Fine Gael did not put this promise into its programme for Government when it was elected.
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