Mercury Dental Fillings Not As Safe As Once Thought
In what’s been called a complete about-face, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued a statement saying metal dental fillings, which are about half mercury, may lead to health problems in vulnerable individuals such as pregnant or nursing women, small children, and other people with compromised immune systems. The new ruling comes on the wake of settlement of a lawsuit filed against the agency by a number of consumer advocacy groups looking to eliminate the use of mercury in dental fillings.
As part of the legal settlement, the FDA must identify all potential risks of the metal fillings on its website and is re-evaluating its rule for use. A new ruling is expected in July 2009. Although a complete ban is desired by some advocates, it is more likely the new ruling will involve label warnings that caution against the use of the metal fillings in certain populations.
Consumer groups opposing the use of metal fillings claim the mercury in them can trigger medical conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease and multiple sclerosis. Mercury is also linked with damage to the kidneys and the brain.
The use of mercury-based fillings, also known as amalgams, has declined over the past several years to the point that only about 30% of all fillings in 2003 were the metal type, according to the American Dental Association. Other options include gold, porcelain, resin composites, and glass cement but they are not as durable as the metal fillings and they cost more.
The FDA says metal fillings do not need to be removed but health risks should be considered before getting more.
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For complete and accurate information on what mercury can do to you, see http://www.noamalgam.com.
The FDA has so far relied on the ADA for false and misleading evaluations of the literature where the credible literature, which all showed harm, was ignored and only poor quality papers which showed no risk were deemed correct and considered.
Aside from being a public health catastrophe, this has led to tremendous public contempt and distain for the medical and dental community and their regulators. The public relations problem can only be resolved by responsible action from professional societies to ban the use of significant amounts of mercury (greater than 1 mcg/day) in health care and to accurately evaluate people with chronic health problems for mercury toxicity and treat them appropriately. Details of how to do this can be found at http://www.noamalgam.com/hairtestbook.html.
While responsible action at this point in time is going to be quite painful for the health care professions, putting it off will make it far worse. Hopefully enough health care providers have the ethics and integrity to read and evaluate journal papers containing actual data (e.g. see DeSoto and Hitlan in J. Child. Neurol. Nov 2007) about the negative health effects of mercury and then advocate appropriate public policy to overcome the inevitable stonewalling and foot dragging by our bureaucratic professional organizations.
[...] has quite simply been deceived. The FDA did a complete about face recently and it now appears that silver amalgam fillings are NOT SAFE for children, young women, and anyone with a compromised immune system. Here is a list of symptoms [...]