December 21, 2014
Dear Supporter:
A note from FAN director Paul Connett
As I said yesterday, “When you are fighting Goliath every stone counts!”
Below Stuart Cooper (FAN’s campaign manager) gives us the scary details about the amount of private and public money the Goliaths of fluoridation promotion are putting together to keep this sordid – anti-science and unethical - practice going. But first here are the details of yesterday’s great fundraising day.
Fundraising summary for Friday Dec 20
Yesterday was another fabulous fundraising day for FAN. We received a total of $9,034 from 66 donors (a record for this fundraiser). As of Dec 21 morning our grand total stands at $81,901 from 421 donors.
This brings two mini-goals much, much closer.
1) We need only 79 more
donors to reach 500 (this number is crucially important for us to
demonstrate to small foundations that we have popular financial
support). If we can do this before midnight Christmas Eve it will
trigger a pledge of $2000. With your help that is doable, but it will
still take many more people chipping into this team effort.
2) We
need another $18,099 to reach $100,000 by midnight Christmas eve. That
will take $4,500 a day. With our current momentum that should be doable,
except Dr. Mercola’s very generous pledge to double everything will be
exhausted when we reach $86,000.
Thus we are hoping that we can attract other supporting angels
to offer an amount that they will double after we reach $86,000. The
doubling and quadrupling of your donations has been a terrific help in
producing our current momentum – and hopefully we can keep that going.This is real team effort between the FAN team working to make our efforts efficient and effective and our loyal supporters who come through each year to make this financially feasible. Without your donations – both large and small - we can achieve very little, but with them we can achieve a lot, as we have shown over the last 15 years.
If you haven’t done so already, please consider sending us your little stone today.
Here is how to donate. It is quick, simple and crucial.
To make a tax-deductible donation you can either:
- Donate online using our secure server.
- Or by check – please make checks payable to Fluoride Action Network and send to: FAN, 104 Walnut Street, Binghamton NY 13905
You can also choose one of the several premiums available at different donation levels.
$60 Million in Taxpayer Dollars Targeted to Promote US Fluoridation
While
you may currently live in a state that does not mandate fluoridation,
and a community that does not practice fluoridation, it doesn’t mean
that you’re safe from the threat of forced fluoridation. We have already
described
the lengths that the promoters of fluoridation will go to, and the huge
amounts of money they will spend in their effort to fluoridate every
public water supply in the U.S., but a relatively new threat has emerged
that could make the campaign much more difficult for all of us. The
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is providing $6.2 million dollars in grants annually
for the next 4 years to 21 states to “improve state oral health
services…such as community water fluoridation.” Meanwhile, the CDC
reports that at least 41% of children aged 12-15 years
of age have dental fluorosis (with another 19.7% in the “questionable”
range) for a possible 60% of this age group with dental fluorosis,
caused by overexposure to fluoride.
The states awarded CDC grants include:
Colorado,
Connecticut, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland,
Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, New Hampshire, New York, North
Dakota, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia
and Wisconsin.
Three
states – Hawaii, Idaho, and New Hampshire – are getting CDC oral health
grants for the first time ever, and will receive $230,000 per year for
up to five years, totaling $1,150,000 million in each state. It should
come as no surprise that these three states are some of the least fluoridated in the U.S.
According to the CDC, the grant money for these states goes to
“developing an oral health surveillance plan, providing additional
staff, developing a state oral health plan, strengthening partnerships
and establishing a diverse state oral health coalition, and implementing
communication strategies to promote oral disease prevention.” In other
words, the $31 million in taxpayer dollars will go towards public
relations, coalition building, and lobbying, rather then directly to
effective oral health prevention, like sealant programs or free dental
programs for children.The other 18 states will each be receiving an average of $310,000 per year (up to $1.5 million total over 5 years) to conduct additional activities, including “increasing the proportion of the population with access to fluoridated water.”
According to the American Dental Association’s “Action for Dental Health.” 2013 booklet, “The New York State Bureau of Dental Health used its 2012 CDC grant to support, strengthen and improve its fluoridation program,” and “CDC funding also supports the Bureau’s promoting fluoridation through a statewide network of volunteer dentist speakers.” Another excerpt from the ADA booklet is from Maryland Director of Oral Health Dr. Harry Goodman, who said, “We used [the grant] to do a lot with our fluoridation program. I can’t imagine where we’d be without the CDC.”
It’s important to keep in mind that the $31 million dollars the CDC is awarding in grants over five years is all taxpayer money approved by Congress for the CDC’s budget. It’s also important to keep in mind that this $31 million will be going directly into the hands of the organizations, lobbyists, and community leaders that promote the expansion of fluoridation. Clearly, fluoridation promotion is a big business that offers financial benefit, influence, and additional staff and resources for those involved.
Calls for Increased Taxpayer Funding
If
$31 million wasn’t enough, the PEW Charitable Trusts has sent
representatives to testify before the U.S. House Appropriations
Committee to ask that the budget be increased by an additional $19 million so all 50 states could be targeted rather then just the 21 currently receiving the grants. According to their testimony:
“This
funding is critical to a state’s ability to prevent problems before
they occur, rather than treating them when they are painful and
expensive. The cooperative agreement program also supports state
community water fluoridation programs and school-based dental sealant
programs, and while funding for this program has been authorized for all
50 states, the Division is currently only able to support 21
states…Research shows that community water fluoridation offers one of
the greatest returns on investment of any preventive health care
strategy…We recommend a funding level sufficient to enable all states
and the District of Columbia to receive the critical CDC prevention
funds, starting with an increase for the coming fiscal year to begin
moving toward full funding.
Funding
request for FY 2015: $19 million for the CDC Division of Oral Health to
expand cooperative agreements to additional states”
PEW
isn’t alone in requesting that more of your tax dollars be spent
forcing fluoridation on citizens. The American Dental Association is
currently supporting active legislation in Congress (H.R.4396-Action for Dental Health Act) that would require the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to provide $10 million dollars annually
to “to organizations implementing Action for Dental Health
initiatives,” including to “ensure more Americans have access to
fluoridated drinking water.”This means that proponents of fluoridation in the United States could soon gain access to an additional $29 million taxpayer dollars to fund their fluoridation propaganda and lobbying campaign, and a total of nearly $60 million when added to the existing CDC grants. Clearly no fluoride-free community is safe from future pressure from the F-lobby. But wait, there’s more.
Other Fluoridation Funders
The
CDC and HHS are not the only organizations providing fluoridation
grants and public relations funding. Others funders include the American Dental Association (also see this), Pew Charitable Trusts, the DentaQuest Foundation, Kaiser Permanente, Delta Dental, and individual state Departments of Health, among others.These groups are dumping millions of dollars annually into campaigns to force fluoridated drinking water on as many citizens as possible, working together with the CDC to achieve their “Healthy People 2020” goal of 80% of the U.S. population having access to fluoridated drinking water.
Conclusion
So
to reiterate, no one is safe from fluoridation, especially if you live
in one of these 21 states already receiving funding. The recent battles
in Portland and Wichita should be a reminder that those who support
fluoridation aren’t just trying to protect it, but are working
aggressively to expand it. They will continue to go down the list of
unfluoridated cities, and states without fluoridation mandates until
they reach their ultimate goal of 100% of community water systems having
“optimal fluoride levels.”To combat these efforts by America’s fluoridation promoters, we will need to work even harder to organize our own local and statewide campaigns, create more educational resources for campaigners, and communicate directly with more decision-makers then ever before. While we don’t have the millions of dollars our opposition does, we do have momentum on our side, with more than 168 fluoride-free victories in just the past 4 years. More importantly, we have the truth on our side, as well as passion rather then profit motivating our campaigners around the country. Please help us maintain this momentum and protect these states from the expansion of fluoridation. Please make a tax-deductible donation today, don’t wait until your town is fluoridated.
Sincerely,
Stuart Cooper
Campaign Manager
Fluoride Action Network
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