I honestly don't understand how our science eduction has failed so spectacularly to even allow these idiots to not be booed out of office. Everybody knows that dihydrogen monoxide/hydroxyl acid is the most dangerous component of our drinking water, and should be removed immediately.

First-term Nudgee LNP MP Jason Woodforth claims he has secured the backing of 31 MPs who "don't agree with mass medicating people" and want the "brain-altering poison" removed.

Despite the weight of expert opinion advocating fluoride as a crucial dental health measure, Mr Woodforth believes the problem of tooth decay could be fixed with diet rather than adding what he labelled "toxic poison" to water.

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/nudgee-lnp-mp-jason-woodforth-claims-31-mps-want-fluoride-out-of-queensland-water/story-e6freoof-1226532471114

I fully support the removal of dihydrogen monoxide/hydroxyl acid from our water supply.

"It's not fluoride, it's fluorine. It's hydrofluorosilicic acid.
"It contains lead, arsenic and mercury. Lead in petrol and lead in paint is a toxin, same with mercury, same with arsenic so if they are no good on their own, what makes them so good in fluorine?"

Mr Woodforth is not a chemistry major, obviously.

HOW DOES GOD FEEL ABOUT US MESSING ABOUT WITH HIS WATER? I BET HES NOT HAPPY ABOUT IT!

http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/388965/20120928/following-harvard-university-lead-more-studies-link.htm#.UMbXZKAs2So

In all, FAN said, 34 studies now link fluoride to lower IQ levels in humans, while scores of other studies correlate fluoride to learning and memory impairment, fetal brain damage, altered neurobehavioral function and altered thyroid hormone levels

The group noted: -- One study, which was sponsored by UNICEF, found that IQ was reduced at just .88 mg/l of fluoride, a level within the "optimal" range added to U.S. drinking water systems for about 200 million Americans. -- Seven studies found reduced IQ levels among children who drank water containing between 2.1 mg/l and 4.0 mg/l, or levels that 1.4 million Americans consume daily.

but its all just quackery isnt it being that harvard and unicef arent reputable sources..

smart state indeed, feed me more iq reducing poison.

Wait, so kids dont need to brush their teeth if we put Fluoride in the water ?
Why cant kids just take a Fluoride Tablet ?

we chould put a little Alcohol in the water too to relax ppl.
And some Aspirin, some anti-depressants, lets throw some vaccines in there too,
Some Vitamin C, Folic Acid.

Water should be just Water.

no, food and water are great ways to put things we lack into the system, fluoride is shown to reduce tooth decay (when consumed in youth)

same with salt, iodine goes into salt because when the milk producers stopped using it to clean their equipment people started to get a little iodine lacking, so it is placed into salt,

I'm sure there are other case as well, but none spring to mind

they should inject vitamins into the water too.

There was no actual Harvard study from what I recall, it was actually just a meta analysis which noted that there was a remote plausible correlation between 20x higher than considered safe flouride levels in an extremely polluted and poor region of China, and a correlated lowered IQ. There were a dozen factors at play, but natural news - the internet's central spewer of bullshit - immediately jumped on it and did a writeup discussing how science had proven that fluoride lowered IQ, then published this as a press release all over the Internet making it look like it was news.

Some nice pandering to the anti-science community here. Seems to be the LNP's trademark.

edit: lol @ cainer

they should inject vitamins into the water too.

For what purpose? Afaik the human body easily gets the necessary amount of vitamins from a regular diet, hence why multivitamins are being labelled a scam and investigated by advertising standards agencies.

iodine is already added to bread, what else are people regularly missing?

My mother took fluoride tablets for my while I was in the womb. I have never had a filling or any teeth problems. I do brush my teeth regularly and always have.

I have 4 younger siblings that my mother didn't take fluoride tablets for. They all have had 5 - 6 + filling each, even when brushing regularly. My younger sister has always been crazy about her teeth, but still has fillings.

I know nothing about the side effects, but I'm glad my mother took it for me.

For what purpose? Afaik the human body easily gets the necessary amount of vitamins from a regular diet, hence why multivitamins are being labelled a scam and investigated by advertising standards agencies.iodine is already added to bread, what else are people regularly missing?

Unfortunately a lot of people don't get adequate vitamins through their shitty diet, so a multi can help fill the gaps. All 3 doctors I've been to over the past few years have recommended vitamins for one thing or the other because they know I've been lacking in something and they've said they see it quite regularly.

Why would a Dr tell you to take Vitamins ?

Because to change a lot of people's diets to actually be healthy and nutritious would basically require a big lifestyle change, but taking a few tablets on top of their shitty diet is a change much easier to swallow (geddit?). Unfortunately GPs are very much a 'get the patient in and out as fast as possible' business.

For a doctor to suggest vitamin supplements without first explaining in detail that it would be massively better to just eat the the right foods is terrible though.

Because to change a lot of people's diets to actually be healthy and nutritious would basically require a big lifestyle change

So Dr recomends taking some pills and continue bad lifestyle ?

Thats LUDICRUOUS

Yes easy fixes are terrible. What we want are fixes that are as complicated and expensive as possible.

Umm, fluoride in water works mate. And it is possible to add fluoride to water and to use public money to fund more dentists. I agree with you that it would be a good thing for that to happen.

True, I see your point now.

What we need is for some speedy evolution to happen so we have teeth like a shark's. I always thought it would be really handy to have rows and rows of back up teeth ready to go for when one falls out.

So Dr recomends taking some pills and continue bad lifestyle ?

Thats LUDICRUOUS

What do you think, people who eat junk food all day every day are going to be told by a GP that they need to eat lots of fresh fruits and vegetables every day and cut down on fatty junk and empty calories and they're just going to go home and do it? Not a chance.

Many people would need serious coaching and support, and the motivation beyond just that they have a deficiency, to achieve that. So of course the GP is going to recommend something that they have a chance of doing that will actually help them, albeit in a less than ideal way.

Of course the GP should explain to them that eating healthy is the best way to go, but addressing those kinds of lifestyle problems in a complete and proper way shouldn't be up to a GP, they should be addressed at an educational level.

we need to add into the water that medicine that stops your body from absorbing fat. i blame the government for not doing this.

Sorry, let me be more specific and this goes for both cainer and you: please cite peer reviewed scientific journal articles and not the fucking shit you two have been posting.

Thanks.

Sorry, let me be more specific and this goes for both cainer and you: please cite peer reviewed scientific journal articles and not the fucking shit you two have been posting.Thanks.

So let me get this straight, you want a peer reviewed scientific journal piece stating that the harvard meta analysis of toxic-level fluoride correlations in China was in fact a harvard meta analysis of toxic-level fluoride correlations in China? Did you try to make the most retarded request plausible?

From the original bloody article:

We performed a systematic review and meta-analysis of published studies

Conclusions: The results support the possibility of an adverse effect of high fluoride exposure on children’s neurodevelopment.

See those words? Meta-analysis? Possibility? High (i.e. already known toxic level) exposure?

Going on about how studies have shown that first world fluoride levels have any negative side effects and quoting that meta analysis in China is a harmful joke. There will never be a scientific publication which is needed to explain as such, because journals are targeted at people with minimum scientific literacy who already understand that the article never claimed or proved what the conspiracy nuts are saying that it did...

what they really need to do is put something in the water that removes toothless bogans from the community

Damn straight. Some type of chemical that can tell if the person drinking it is on welfare or has a mullet/ratstail.

i am so happy i spent the first 8 years of my life growing up in Sydney where they put fluoride in the water.. never had a filling

no fillings here. that's what i get for brushing my teeth every day.

Fuck me, some of you guys spout some shit without any actual research into the subject.

- Firstly Fluoride is only effective when topically applied to the teeth, ingesting the substance in large quantities OR over time can lead to fluorosis (the substance is cumulative) Source: http://fluoridation.com/skeletal.htm
- The effects on the brain from ingestion can be found in quite a few sources: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7760776?dopt=Abstract and the effects on children IQ: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3491930/
- Fluorosis leads to damaging the human bone structure over time: http://europepmc.org/abstract/MED/3295994/reload=0;jsessionid=sL82fegZemv70dQCL9dU.8
- Yes the levels are low but consider that we don't just drink the water, we shower in it, we wash our food in it and we use it to clean food preparation utensils.
- Check out how many countries (especially European ones) that don't add fluoride their water supply: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluoridation_by_country

I used to care but now I'm on tank water.

What we need is for some speedy evolution to happen so we have teeth like a shark's. I always thought it would be really handy to have rows and rows of back up teeth ready to go for when one falls out.

You want to get a blowjob from a shark?

from dr karl twitter

does fluoride in out water have any negative effects?
dr karls answer, yes, but much less than the positive effects


pretty well sums up why it is done,

The effects on the brain from ingestion can be found in quite a few sources: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7760776?dopt=Abstract

This set of experiments is designed to look at absurdly high doses to try and examine where things go wrong.

the effects on children IQ: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3491930/

This is the same article as previous stated and is simple data aggregation that the researchers admit in the article makes for a weakened control.

I drink only rain water and pure grain alcohol to protect the sanctity of my precious bodily fluids

I'm looking forward to loutl's hilarious contribution to this thread.

Fuck look at all the crazy up in this bitch!

It's just more nanny state bullshit isn't it?

Nope not really.

Problem: Kids rotten teeth
Solution: Educate kids about not drinking so many carbonated drinks and eating candy.

Is that so hard? People need to take control and improve their life rather have everything done for them.

Or you could do this, and fluoridate the water. It's not like they had a meeting where they had a big discussion about either adding fluoride to the water supply or setting up a good education scheme about the hazards of excessive consumption of carbonated drinks and sugary treats. It is quite possible to do both. The problem with education is that for some people it just doesn't stick. I mean, there are parents out there who still take drugs/drink/smoke when they are pregnant. Do you really think they are going to give a fuck about their kids teeth when it comes to cans of coke? Somehow I think they are going to buy their kids that Kinder Surprise if it means them shutting the fuck up.

but why draw the line at teeth

We should also put antibiotics in the water.

hmmmm, i drink a lot of water, im not sure i want a lot of antibiotics.

hmmmm, i drink a lot of water, im not sure i want a lot of antibiotics.

Yes, but you also have a lot of hepatitis. Just what I heard is all.

Yes, but you also have a lot of hepatitis. Just what I heard is all.

that reminds me matey, ive been meaning to call, you should get tested. im not 100% clear on what happened at cricket the other nite!

there's no other comparable product that could be delivered via the water supply for perceived health benefits of the general population? Or is being 'easily' delivered via water supply the only 'easy' method of delivery? Seems sort of arbitrary when you consider other things the government spends money on, and the infrastructure to support them.

I mean I'm not for or against fluoride in water cos I've simply never bothered looking into it and have no idea one way or the other, it just seems like a reasonable question

Wouldn't (and don't) those people chose to drink out of their rain water tanks?

people who say that quantum healing isn't real.

I'm confused, surely you mean that they've bought into people that say it is real?

we should be putting ritalin in the water. so much undiagnosed adhd we need to help.

Almost like saying people that don't want Fluoride would be drinking out of dirty ditches...

Fluroride isnt used to clean the water.

I dont know how you make the leap from Fluroride to water treatment.
Treating the water makes it cleaner.
Adding Fluoride to it pollutes the water.

No, anybody saying that the government is wrong to be doing "mass medication" with water doesn't recognise that clean water already is public mass medication

yeah fair enough

it's not that I wanted to spout ideological catch phrases, it's just that I hadn't ever given it much thought which is why I jumped straight to 'why bother with teeth and nothing else'

as for catching and treating your own drinking water, I've always thought it was a better idea than having the requirement of mass water treatment and supply. less so obviously in areas that have bugger all rain, but even in qld it's viable for at least a large % of your own water (did it myself for ~8 years)

I often look at water running out of the tap and imagine the cost and effort involved in the long journey it took all the way from the catchment through treatment works and miles of pipes to my tap, only to exist for a brief moment in the relatively tiny distance from the tap to the drainhole and it's gone again, off into another government-provided infrastructure designed to carry it away and often pollute some body of water not too far away. it can make for some pretty obsessive tap flicking ;)

I've always felt like it'd be a lot better if the general expectation of people living in suburbia was to provide at least a decent chunk of their own water - not for anything to do with fluoridation, just because it seems wasteful to have to provide tap water to vast urban sprawls and essentially ignore relatively clean water that falls onto so many rooftops

It's incredibly annoying to know that they're damaging their health

how are they damaging their own health?

These people are just inconsistently spouting harmful ideological catch phrases

...Almost like saying people that don't want Fluoride would be drinking out of dirty ditches...

I like Fluoride int the water, I think it's a good thing for the general health of the population. But when you speak like that, you're no better than the people you're acusing of such tactics.

But seriously how about a subsidy for fluoride based toothpastes to make it so cost effective for everyone? At least then people will be adding it topically to their teeth with minimal ingestion.

The cost of toothpaste isn't the issue, it's a behavioural problem. Some parents simply don't teach their kids to brush their teeth properly.

Yeah, but saying that people that don't want fluoride may as well drink out of a ditch is just as bad as infi saying that since we have fluoride we might as well add ritalin.

Both have sweet fuck all to do with Fluoride being put into our water. You were calling out other people on the very same tactic you were, and still are, employing.

Right, sorry. I must have missunderstood your stance again. My mistake.
Two sides of the same coin man. You're both using slippery slope, just falling down different sides of the hill.

You're both using slippery slope, just falling down different sides of the hill.

.. How on earth is it a slippery slope to highlight that by definition government water is mass medication? Do you even know what that means?

The natural state of animals is to drink dirty water out of holes in the ground. That's not a... slope, that's a fact of reality, which people who think that clean water always magically came out of taps since humans evolved completely ignore.



Government provided clean water is mass medication, mass medication is not a bad thing. If one argues against something on the grounds of mass medication, then they are arguing against mass clean water, which has improved our civilization's health dramatically.

Government provided clean water is mass medication?

Chlorine is a disinfectant, its not really medicating.

adding something to remove impurities isn't the same as adding a chemical specifically to be metabolized. suggesting it does is why you're getting called out on the slippery slope argument.

last edited by Captain Lateral at 13:37:42 13/Dec/12

You are bad at reading comprehension. I was responding to people saying that mass medication is by definition bad

Exactally, by using the same logical fallacy as them, but going in the other direction. Cleaning/treating water isn't medication.

Having a working sewerage system isn't mass medication either. Hygine maybe, but not medication.

Cleaning/treating water isn't medication.

Hahaha, yes it is, it's just one which you're familiar with.

Water is an orally consumed chemical. The government providing water in the first place is mass medication against many terrible conditions ("I'll just collect or buy my own water when I want it daggnagit, I don't need this 'mass medication!'").

This is a child suffering from dehydration, due to not being so fortunate as to have been born somewhere with mass water medication to prevent against the disease:



Water to solve these issues did not just magically happen, it was a mass public health move.

On top of that, the government providing clean water is yet another mass medication against many terrible diseases that people would have if using other (traditional) sources, and has improved public health dramatically for it.

Hygine isn't medication.

Quick, I've been proven wrong, better post an emotive picture/story to distract people.

Hygine isn't medication.

The fuck? Who said anything about hygiene?

We were talking about the modern invention of mass publicly available drinking water to prevent against disease and dehydration. It can be used for hygiene, but we're talking about the medical benefits of ingesting water (it leads to prolonged life, if done right, but you're seemingly so familiar with just having it for free or near-free that you're not able to see it as a measurable beneficial-with-costs chemical for intake which wasn't always available to everyone, the same as oxygen or fluoride or iron).

Quick, I've been proven wrong

... About what?

Medicating > to treat with medicine

And what on Earth do you think that H2O does? The now publicly available medicine against many diseases, which lead to quick death, and fuck over many people in the world who do not have it. That is public mass medication.

We provide water to protect against short term diseases such as dehydration, and that's fine.
We provide fluoride to protect against long term disease such as tooth decay, and suddenly that's mass medication?

I mean, is oxygen a medication against asphyxiation?

Of course, it's just one that we're familiar with coming to us easily, like water. However the government doesn't have any real imperative to provide it, and can only really ensure that the air is clean, it's easily gained without help, like vitamin D. It's just another thing that benefits the human condition and the arbitrary goal of staying healthy, and thus alive, for as long as possible.

In medicine, Oxygen is considered a drug and must be signed for. It can be toxic at high doses. It works to prevent health concerns which arrive much faster without it, and doctors will provide it if you are lacking it -


iodine, water, fluoride - these are harder chemicals to come by, and so mass medication exists for all of them. It has improved our civilization dramatically.

The human body is just a chemical machine. Flawed and fragile at that. No chemical is more 'right' than another, it's all a measure of effectiveness at different doses.

What? Dehydration isn't a disease it's a condition.

What do you call tooth decay smart arse? :P

Why do I get the impression that this thread was created for the primary purpose of vehemently arguing with whoever responds to it?

Jim was lovely. There's just a few enormous idiots who I have a low fuse for.

---

On a side note, check out all these known negative effects of the drug which the medical community refers to as 'oxygen' guys, we need to take this knowledge out of pragmatic context the same as the fluoride debate, and argue for banning it - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_therapy#Negative_effects

Oxygen cant be toxic at any level while on the land under normal circumstances.

And so we don't need to worry about it as much as water or salt or fluoride intoxication, but it is a chemical that works all the same, just a much harder one to go wrong on.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_toxicity

Also, you and I both know that taggs meant Air, as in 21% Oxygen, 78% Nitrogen and 1% fuck you gas.

I have no idea what the difference is supposed to be? Either way, oxygen ("air") is considered a drug. Air is considered a medicine/drug intended to be delivered via medical procedures such as CPR.

They make drinking water hygenic, they don't medicate it...

Providing it in the first place IS medicating it, juts like iodine and fluo - You know what, fuck you. You're not actually looking for honest answers, you've just turned up to pick a fight with me as in every single thread you post in, and I have work to do.

Oxygen cant be toxic at any level

yes it can, well, ozone is oxygen in another form

end troll

. People arguing against "mass medication" need to explain why it's ok with one chemical and not another.

i tried Nerf, you're just ignoring me :<

Providing Clean water isn't medication.

Failed reading compression for the five thousandth time. I repeatedly differentiated between providing water, and then also providing clean water. As I just said in response to you last time you said this, the act of publicly providing water itself is a relatively new mass medication.

Providing H2O, and providing clean H2O, are just as much mass medical chemical provisioning as providing F-. One cannot argue against the later on mass medication grounds without arguing against the former.

Are you seriously calling Air a drug?

Yes, the same as the medical community, or anybody who understands basic evolution and chemistry, and that biological life is just the process of surviving with whatever beneficial resources are available for as long as possible. Common or no.

i tried Nerf, you're just ignoring me :<

Permalink to the post where you explained why the mass provision principle is ok with one chemical (H2O) and not another (F-).

Oh jesus, fine, then water is provided to protect against diseases which are caused by dehydration.

Staying away from sick people helps to prevent disease as well, do you consider keeping an adequate distance to be medication? Though I notice you've classed air as a drug as well, so I doubt we'll be able to come to an agreement on terminology.

Staying away from sick people helps to prevent disease as well, do you consider keeping an adequate distance to be medication?

Hello, the medical community developed this amazing technique called quarantine, which greatly improved public help. Primitive people had trouble understanding why that was 'forced on them' too.

Quarantine, gloves, face masks, are a medical solution not taken orally, so are not drugs/medicines/chemicals like water/iodine/fluorine/glucose/oxygen/proteins/etc.

on which we can't survive without

You can't survive as long*. Fluoride solves problems on a different time scale to water, but they're both doing the same thing in improving your health beyond where you would be otherwise, and both are publicly provided on mass scales to improve public health.

One is just so familiar as ubiquitously available to you that you're making a special pleading fallacy, "because it's water duh, water is the health chemical that I'm used to having available to me". And one can survive without food for up to several weeks, without water for days, without oxygen for minutes. We all die, but it's a matter of time scale for what we have available to solve. Many in the world do not get access to water or food, and so will die sooner - these things are luxuries against death. Bad oral hygiene is a major contributor to cardiac failure, on a relevant time scale it is also deadly.

Why are short term medication solutions ok to mass medicate, but not long term?

one is a naturally sought out compound, on which we can't survive without, the other is an additive to the previously sought out compound.

You're making the exact mistake that I just said that people were going to make, where you're so used to water access being near-freely available - as is new in human history - that you simply see it as an inherent right that will always be there for you, you don't recognise that it's something that had to be built and earned and isn't guaranteed during one's time on Earth, it's a public mass medication, it doesn't get special pleading in classification as not being a helpful drug or chemical which extends health and life. In reality it is just a now-ubiquitously-available useful chemical as one of the accomplishments of our civilization, as fluoride can now be too.

Just as how most humans in the past, and many today, did not and do not have that access to water and suffer and die for it, which we consider a primitive and backwards sad state of affairs, so to do many today not have access to mouth-saving fluoride, and we can fix that so so easily without any notable complications, just like how we provided water to the point that we got people like you saying "Water? That's just what I need to stay alive." - your expectations of what a justified length of life is have simply been raised. 'Nature' never changed nor was kind to creatures who needed water, many of us here would be dead from dehydration at this age if we lived in 'nature'. Some of us still sometimes are - http://www.news.com.au/national/mauritz-mo-pieterse-dies-of-thirst-and-heat-exhaustion-on-10km-walk-after-car-bogged-in-extreme-temperatures/story-fndo4ckr-1226512128827 . Nature will not simply 'give you water' as a perpetual right to live, that's just what you're used to in the first world, where it had to be planned and earned for our longevity benefit, as fluoride is being now.

And yes, evolution shaped mammals to be good at recognising that they would benefit from acquiring water, but it didn't shape us for diagnosing and treating cancers within ourselves, or not eating too much fat, or managing diabetes or eyesight, or protecting our teeth, or living past our 20s, or a million other things where we have improved upon our biological capabilities and instincts. The naturalistic fallacy is well known for a reason.

Hello, the medical community developed this amazing technique called quarantine

A technique that is useful to the medical community sure, but it's not medication.

tldr, everyone agrees fluoride is great right

So what exactly is your point?

My point is that access to clean drinking water, clean air and quarantine practices aren't medications, they're simply hygiene.

Well, I haven't said one word about flouride and my daughter has so far had all of her scheduled vaccinations, but for sure you're right, there's no way I came from a monkey.

(the idea that we and our children would be better off leaving all the carbon in ground is still fantasy though)

where you're so used to water access being near-freely available - as is new in human history - that you simply see it as an inherent right that will always be there for you, you don't recognise that it's something that had to be built and earned and isn't guaranteed during one's time on Earth, it's a public mass medication,

er, water has been near-freely available since before we climbed out of the ocean. (before that, freely available)

are drinking out of water wells mass medication? someone had to put effort into drilling into the ground to provide it to mass amount of people. how is that different?

Nerf is pro homeopathy.

And yet the vaccine thread is full of you spreading hysteria about vaccines killing children, so I'm going to presume that there was another parent involved in vaccinations. ;)

It is no surprise to me that you didn't understand my point at all. You may have escaped the Catholic Church but you are still ruled by Dogma and you don't even see it.

Who said that anybody except monkeys came from monkeys? Being humans by definition means that you are an ape and come from apes, it's a statistical reality that your DNA fits snugly in the great ape family by regular classification of genetic similarity. If you asked a computer to categorize your DNA, it would say: "The same as all the other Apes with minor variations".

Wow, that one flew right over your head didn't it? 8)

At least you don't sound as brain dead as you did when you were arguing so persuasively that water and air are drugs. It does explain why everyone takes you so seriously! ,_,

The same as growing or harvesting any other ingestible material for helping humans live longer and healthier.

What?..

By this definition wouldn't agriculture (e.g. growing rice) be a form of mass medication?..

I wonder if a doctor would agree with your definitions.

The LNP also would prefer people don't have their own water tanks. Or rather, they want councils to not be able to tell you that you need one. About 500 water tank industry jobs are at risk.
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/queensland-government-to-scrap-green-home-laws-20121214-2bedx.html

The LNP also hates your gas/solar hot water.



last edited by thermite at 14:42:34 14/Dec/12

Let me be the magical elf and point out that ozone may refer to the chemical O3 or the ozone layer which contains mostly chemicals other than ozone.

Also oxygen is indeed toxic and was responsible for the Oxygen holocaust which killed most life forms on earth. But if it wasn't for that, we may never have evolved. I say bring on the flouride and the carbon! FOR THE FUTURE

What?..By this definition wouldn't agriculture (e.g. growing rice) be a form of mass medication?.. I wonder if a doctor would agree with your definitions.

Not if it's private enterprise. An intravenous drip would be considered medication surely.

The main point was always that we did not have mass clean water at any point in history until recently, it was a mass health move against many medical problems, the same as fluoride is as a move against tooth decay. People who argue against fluoride on that basis have no point to make unless they also argue against mass clean water which was done for our health.

Anything which you put into you is a chemical/drug/whatever, people trying to create fear around something being a 'chemical' have to also argue against H2O and O2, both of which are toxic at their toxic doses.

are drinking out of water wells mass medication? someone had to put effort into drilling into the ground to provide it to mass amount of people. how is that different?

Of course it is, if somebody does it for a mass of people. The same as growing or harvesting any other ingestible material for helping humans live longer and healthier.

...

What?..By this definition wouldn't agriculture (e.g. growing rice) be a form of mass medication?.. I wonder if a doctor would agree with your definitions.

Not if it's private enterprise.

I'm even more confused than before.

Earlier, you said that wells providing drinking water was a form of mass medication. You also said that growing or harvesting any ingestible material for the purpose of helping humans live longer and heathier was a form of mass medication.

Now you are saying that this doesn't hold if it is a result of private enterprise?..

Surely a large number of wells around the world have been provided by private enterprise. Does this mean that only the wells that were a result of state spending are to be considered mass medication? Does this mean that state funded agriculture is mass medication whereas private agriculture isn't?

Again, I wonder what someone with actual medical training would say about your definitions.

Ok can some give me a Haiku summary of this thread so I don't have to read it all.

Libs say flouride's bad
Nerf starts well then digs a hole
One more thread derailed

Libs say flouride's bad
Nerf starts well then digs a hole
One more thread derailed

slow clap

bravo!

Earlier, you said that wells providing drinking water was a form of mass medication. You also said that growing or harvesting any ingestible material for the purpose of helping humans live longer and heathier was a form of mass medication.

Now you are saying that this doesn't hold if it is a result of private enterprise?...

How can it be government mass medication if it's private enterprise? People are (for some fucked up reason) complaining that the government is providing mass medication against tooth decay, yet don't complain about the government providing mass medication against dehydration and water borne disease and other formerly-prevalent conditions when people had to get water themselves, just like how we had to, until recently, get fluoride ourselves if we wanted to address those health concerns.

If you cannot see that distinction... ah fuck it.

You are purposefully playing dumb at this point, ignoring that I've said like 8 times now that it's about providing any water in the first place, not only about clean water.

Providing mass public drinking water in the first place - which you otherwise wouldn't have - is mass medication. They're not cleaning water that you would have either way, they're providing the public with water in the first place as a mass health move, moving away from the situation that we used to be in of not everybody having it.

I don't know why I bother trying to speak sense and consistency to those who have unfortunately justified the birth of the word 'libtards'. If you scientifically illiterates can't get it through your heads that both water and fluoride are chemicals used to realise human health outcomes, now provided by the government and getting effective results, then I feel that we need better science education in this country.

Medication is "A substance used for medical treatment"

Yes? And how does that not apply to water? We ingest it and use it to treat dehydration, and thankfully live in a time where we can get used to being spoiled on it and living much longer than people previously could, to the point that we've just started thinking of it as "something that people have all their lives, it's special". It doesn't change what its form is, nor how it's taken, nor its mechanisms, nor that it was provided en masse by the government to improve the civilization's health, just as anything else could be.

Putting H2O into your body = chemical drug.
Putting F- into your body = chemical drug.
Putting caffeine into your body = chemical drug.

All of these things are chemicals, have toxic doses, and are ingested, with effects on the body. There's no special pleading fallacies allowed.

If the government provided mass alcohol to treat anxiety, that would be mass medication, just the same as mass H2O is. We might get used to it, and after enough generations come to think of it as "just what we have, it's special", but it wouldn't change its form or mechanism, nor that it's no different than providing mass water or mass fluoride. (it wouldn't however have any scientific soundness)

Well you don't ingest 'air conditioning' as a chemical any more than you ingest a centrifuge (though there may well be a few a few kids or elderly people out there with respiratory problems who rely on treated air), whereas water is absolutely positively empirically a toxic-at-certain-levels chemical ingested for human health, which we've now come to just expect as an always-present substance in our life provided by the government, done to improve the public health, whereas it used to be a private enterprise to obtain, the same as fluoride until recently, which has been beneficial to public health to provide for free to the masses.

If the government provides mass washing water, it's not mass medication. If the government provides mass drinking water, it's mass medication. If there's a protein shortage, and the government provides mass protein pills, then it's mass medication.

except this water which is life sustaining (taken for granted in the first world economies) and provided by and maintained to a standard by the government at some level is not exactly as 'free' as you are making it out to be. land owners sure do know about paying rates on services.

maybe you're a renter and it's factored into the weekly cost of living so you never hear much about it?

didn't you get a 4 minute hourglass shower timer with a suction cup from the Bligh gubberment?

Water is water.

Special pleading.

Clean or not

I said so many times that it wasn't about clean, it was about providing.

it predates the concept of medical.

The atom F pre-dates the molecule H2O, it was forged during the big bang, and both pre-date brains even capable of conceptualising the label 'medical', yet biology used them to its benefit for billions of years without any concepts required. Cultural concepts of chemicals don't change whether something does a task, nor what it's made of.

Biology doesn't function on whether a brain conceptualises the value of chemicals for health, life just has what works for it at a given time. Algae doesn't thrive on water because of some concept that it has about it, it does because it's beneficial for its health, conditionally, as is water and fluoride for mammals. You're really just saying "plentiful water is a familiar beneficial chemical provided to me so it's ok, plentiful fluoride for my health is not familiar to me in this way, it doesn't have a cultural history and the benefits aren't seen as quickly."

except this water which is life sustaining (taken for granted in the first world economies) and provided by and maintained to a standard by the government at some level is not exactly as 'free' as you are making it out to be. land owners sure do know about paying rates on services.

Exactly, this mass supply of water is no more 'the natural state' of things than mass supply of fluoride, it's just pre-established and familiar. We didn't always just "have water" in our lives. People used to suffer and their health would decay for not having access to it, and then the government made it a universally delivered chemical. Same with fluoride for tooth decay.

Water and fluoride both have major understood health benefits, and could both be left up to private endeavours to acquire. Nobody is forcing you to take the government supply of these chemicals, but it would be stupid and ill-informed not to.

lol, water is a food, its not a drug.

Caffeine, glucose, and cocoa are both foods and drugs, as is essentially everything consumed. You put chemicals into you for your health, be it Oxygen or Fluoride or H2O. Some have short term benefits (O2) for your survival, some have long term benefits (I), some have even longer term benefits (F-). Foods and Drugs are basically indistinguishable, separated by language but not by real features, thus why you get things like the american 'Food and Drug Administration' (FDA).

What if you brush your teeth and drink flouridiated water? Double whammy of IQ losses in the eugenics stats tally?

From the sounds of things, for the amount of fluoride contained in our water, you'd die from a toxic water dose before reaching a toxic fluoride dose. Swallowing toothpaste would probably increase your risks though...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_intoxication
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluoride_toxicity
http://www.fluoridedebate.com/question21.html

"A survey of X-rays from 170,000 people in Texas and Oklahoma whose drinking water had naturally occurring fluoride levels of 4 to 8 ppm revealed only 23 cases of osteosclerosis and no cases of skeletal fluorosis."
I think that in Australia, it's something like .9 to 1.4 ppm.

water is medication. this guy.... pffft

I know that you have a particular aversion to thinking, and prefer to communicate in political party stock phrases and/or sneering, but try to rationally justify your special pleading for why it is not.

Water is a chemical food/drug (the difference is ever shifting cultural definitions, not physically or functionally empirical).
Water is taken orally.
Water is toxic at specific doses.
Water is beneficial to mammal health. Those that get more can more plausibly live longer.

So used to being spoiled on our modern plentiful water, that you simply think of it as something that all life gets just by virtue of existing, something 'special' above all other chemicals and drugs which you put into your body. Water is an ingested health chemical like any other, and it wasn't until recently that the masses got it provided to them by the government for mass health.

Just as a diabetic must be given the medication insulin to survive, humans must be given the medication of water to survive. These are both medications against ill health and death.

I think you're delivering your view of it via a somewhat wild tangent compared to how most people will give any thought to how their drinking water is delivered.

Maybe if you work in a pleasently controlled environment that has an endless supply of chilled filtered Neverfail delivered twice a week, you might give some government credit for that at some time in the progressive advances that science has brought to humanity such foresight was put into public health for your mass medication idea, but maybe it's just because they worked it out that preventative is a bit cheaper and less painful than public dental healthcare schemes.

but is it mass medication in the same way an oktoberfest is mass social lubrication? 7 out of 10 qgl'ers in this thread seem to disagree

Didnt really read into nerf's reasons behind water is medicine but if vitamin c prevents scurvy, and is thus a medicine, then water preventing dehydration should be the same thing? Its just that food (and water) is so common that i dont think many people would consider something so daily and trivial to be medicine compared to drugs that i guess most people would feel is more appropriate. Water taken orally doesnt mean shit though. Intravenous, rectal or whatever method of application for whatever appropriate medicine is still legit medicine.

Yep exactly, but keep in mind that say for a diabetic, insulin shots are needed just as commonly for immediate health as drinking water is for regular humans (maybe even needed more frequently), but it never stops being medicine just because it's common.

If you ingest/inject something regularly for your health, then it is medicine. Government mass provision of water, for allowing everybody to deal with hydration health without resorting to private enterprise, is in principle the same thing as government mass provision of fluoride - except fluoride is much cheaper for them to do.

Never realised breakfast was medicine.

And so clearly you haven't thought chemistry and mortality through. ;)

Write a computer classifier to distinguish between medicine and food based on some meaningful physical property or effect on the human body, and not some arbitrary stubborn refusal to admit that these two things are exactly the same, and see how easy it is. ;) Is a diabetic's regulated sugar intake a matter of taking drugs or eating food? What about a non-diabetic who needs the same thing but can process it differently to go slightly longer?