Fluoridation cancer evidence allegedly suppressed
By DAVE TOPLIKAR
Suppression of evidence showing the hazards of water floridation has been going on for more than 20 years.
Albert W. Burgstahler, professor of chemistry, said Friday that public health officials, to save face in the public eye, have been ignoring documented reports that proved water fluoridation caused health problems.
He said the situation was even more serious than before because of a recent report to Congress that said the state's police had been
THE REPORT, made by John Ylamoyiannis, scientist director of the National Health Federation, states that 500,000 people alive today can expect to be fluoridated unless fluoridation in the United States is stopped.
flouridation into a water supply, there was an increase in cancer mortality within a few months or
increase in cancer mortality within a few months or
Yamouyiannias will speak tonight on topic to an undergraduate chemistry seminar at 7:30 p.m. in 122 Malot. Burgsterhalz said the report stated there was no evidence of a gender imbalance in statistics data showing that after the introduction of
Most cities using flouidation for dental reasons try to maintain a concentration in the water of about one part per million. Burgsthal said, which is about one milligram per quart.
BURGSTAHLER SAID that concentration of one part per million was what the study showed to be
He said the report specifically looked at cities flouridated in the early 1980s and compared them with the cities that remained unflouridated during a 20-year period.
"They've created quite a storm of controversy because no one suspected that this sort of thing occurred."
Burgstaffer said the normal fluoridation concentration could cause various toxic effects in the fish.
"THESE ARE EFFECTS ranging from headaches to a pinned throat when you wake in the morning to being run over by a dog."
commonly the pain in the upper stomach felt after
cutting one's hair. It's a general feeling of
blasted discomfort," he said.
Headaches, dry throat and the gastrointestinal
upsets are combination affecting most people,
Broad surge in cancer.
"TVE HAD a number of students in class who I've suspected had these problems, and they were complaining about these symptoms, so I suggested drinking fluoride-free water. Almost invariably they came back and reported a tremendous improvement or a disappearance of these symptoms," he said.
Burgstahl said Lawrence has had fluoridated water since 1963. He said that when it first was introduced it was approved by the state health department, and the state brought U.S. Health Service endorsement in 1960.
Burgstahl said that opposition was restricted to lay people and that the University as a whole came to accept it.
"IF IT TURNS out that fluoridation is really corrosive and dangerous, I think we’re going to see a catastrophe."
Burgstahl said the wake of endorsements from prestigious organizations such as the American Medical and Dental Associations caused negative findings to be disregarded.
scientific community has been very reluctant to take up and study these negative findings, " he said.
"There's a big momentum going, and no physician, ountist or public health office can comfortably step up."
But Burgstahler said he had no illusions as to what would happen to the report.
Burgsthaler said the Lawrence City Commission had asked for a nonpartisan report on water fluoridation. He wanted to get the fullest and most accurate presentation to the commissioners in the next few months.
"THAT REPORT will be sent on to Topea for evaluation and comment, then to Washington, where we'll get the usual propaganda blurb, which is, 'Our people have looked at this and have seen no evidence here and assure you that fluoridation is safe and effective.' That'll be it," he said.
Burgstahler said the problem was that the image of the Public Health Service would be hurt.
"That's the problem. The man's professional future in public health would be rather nil once he started work as a nurse."
Burgstahler said this attitude ignored concrete results.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY
"There they would have you use levels of 700 to 800 times of what you normally ingest. Here we're talking about the same concentration, relatively the same amounts that we are using right now," he said.
He said that saccharine and cyclamates were dealt with much more quickly than fluorides, but on water only the latter.
THE EVIDENCE for fluoride's increasing cancer, burglarish age, is far stronger than it is for sarcophageal cancer.
Burgsthaler added that the dental profession said its reputation was on the line.
"They say, 'Who are you to believe in, the experts who know about teeth, or those crazy scientists who know about hair?'
Vol.88.No.20
KANSAN
Lawrence, Kansas
The University of Kansas
Monday September 26,1977
Staff. Photo by JOHN SHARKEY
Sheer iou
Cheers arise in Memorial Stadium as the Kansas Jayhawks score a touchdown Saturday.
Chris Fox, Shawne sophomore, and Jet Livelyke, Kansas City, Kan., junior, display their enthusiasm for the Javahws' feat.
Senate to debate recognition rule
By LEON UNRUH
The Senate Rights Committee voted unanimously last night to support the petition, which asks that administrative fees be eliminated from the funding procedures.
Staff Writer
A petition asking University of Kansas administrators to change the procedure student groups use to ask for student accountability has been presented to the Student Senate Wednesday.
All groups intending to ask the Senate for funds must now file a registration form in the office of the vice chancellor for student affairs. The group must meet three qualifications to be recognized by the vice chancellor as a fundable campus group.
The qualifications are that the groups may not be substantially oriented toward support of or opposition to particular religious institutions, activities or beliefs; particular political party activities or programs; or particular personal and customarily private activities, habits or proclivities.
THE PETTITION approved by the rights committee asks the administrators to allow all groups to be registered, as is done now, and helps to recognize the groups be eliminated.
The executive vice chancellor has the power to veto any allocations made by the Senate, a point that Reggie Robinson, rights committee chairman, opposed.
Robinson said it didn't make sense for administrators to be able to deny recognition at the beginning and later be able to veto allocations.
He said the Senate, not the administration, should have original
jurisdiction on what funding requests should be heard.
Last spring, during allocation hearings,
three groups were denied recognition:
Young Democrats, College Republicans and
Hillel, a religious organization.
Donald Alderson, then acting vice chancellor for student affairs, withheld recognition but asked StudEx to examine the procedure.
FIVE MEMBERS of StudEx — Robinson, Don Green, Ralph Muney, Katie Rhoads and Sam Zweifel — worked with Alderson and Vickie Thomas, assistant to the University general counsel, to prepare a plan and recommendation on possible changes.
Their committee proposed keeping the current registration procedure but suggested forming a three-member committee to determine the recognition.
Steve Leben, student body president, did not accept the ad hoc committee proposal and instead presented the idea of eliminating administration recognition.
Although Robinson had previously voted to forward the ad hoc committee proposal, he switched his position to favor Leben's proposal.
If the petition is approved Wednesday by the full Senate, it will be sent to Chancellor Krug.
Leben was optimistic about the petition and the chance of administrative change.
"This wouldn't go into effect right away because it is an administrative change and has to be done by the men upstairs," Robinson said.
"I would say we have a good chance of it getting passed, but it's not guaranteed by the law."
KU bus service given high marks
Rv STEVE PARSONS
Staff Writer
If you must wait for a bus that is a little behind schedule or smother in the midst of wet bodies on a bus holding twice the riders it was built for, just remember that the "KU on Wheels" bus service has been rated as one of the best in the country.
The rating was made in a study of trans-
portation needs in Lawrence being done for
Kansas and Unified School District 497 with
a grant from the Urban Mass Transit Ad-
ministration.
The $2,000 study by the Henningson, Durham and Richardson planning firm of Aeromedia made presentations for meeting area transportation needs. It is scheduled to be completed by Nov. 15, but the first phase, analyzing the current transit systems, was released on June 30.
STEVE MCMURRY, chairman of the Student Senate Transportation Committee said last week, "I'm surprised with the rate I ranked much higher than I expected."
The Student Senate controls the system which is maintained and staffed by the League.
Bennett to visit KU for forum
Gov. Robert Bennett will answer students' questions at an open forum from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. today in the Big Eight Room of the Kansas Union.
Afterwards, Bennett will attend an informal lunchon with student leaders.
Duane E. Ogle, president-general manager of the LBC, said that all of the "KU on Wheels" buses are chartered from LBC. He said he use to have a bus service in Lawrence, but it went out of business in 1972. The Senate Started "KU on Wheels" in 1972.
Bennett's stop in Lawrence is in conference town of town hall meetings throughout Kannan.
According to the study, the bus service receives a guaranteed hourly rate to ensure continued operation. The bus service is not covered by bus passes and cash fares and paid by a part of the campus privilege fee that each student pays at enrollment. The fee for fall 1976 was $1.00.
WHEN COMPARED with city systems across the country, the subsidy is low. The KU system pays for 66 per cent of its costs by fares from riders, which is above the 54 per cent average, the study stated. Wichita's system gets 46 per cent and Kansas City. Mo.,gets 48 per cent from its customers to operate the system.
The study said Lawrence's 66 per cent would be higher if profit, income tax and depreciation of equipment were deleted from the other systems. The figures as they are from the other systems.
The study stated that 90 per cent rate of trips made by bus passes was one of the highest rates in the United States for transfer (75 per cent) and each trip and "a bargain by any standard."
THE COUNTERFEITING and pass transferring problems were "insignificant" when compared to the benefits of using bus passes, according to the study.
The speed and simplicity of using the passes and the desirable flow of cash before it was spent were some of those benefits, the reported indicated.
The high figure reportedly was due to the high operations and high ridership for the KUH.
system was more "normal" when compared with other university systems.
It added that considering the number of hours of use and the population at KU the
The planner doing the study chose seven other universities with similar populations: Iowa, Virginia, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Syracuse, Texas Tech and Kent State. He gathered data from the schools to compare their transit systems with KU's.
He said that the campus bus systems differed so much that efficiency comparisons were difficult, and that universities with free bus systems, such as Texas Tech, naturally would have a high student fee to cover costs.
The real comparisons, McMurray said, were between the city systems and KU because city systems are subsidized as well as the KU system.
According to the study, the administration "has shown little outward recognition of the value 'KU on Wheels' has to the total campus access and circulation system."
BRANT MCFALL, Lawrence city director of personnel and the one ramrodring the office in the courtyard. Senate decides not to support this service, you won't see it any more. At least not in its
McMurray did the basic problem was the question of the University administration's role in the college.
However, several problems were pointed out in the study.
It mentioned a recent study by the Chancellor's Ad-Hoc Committee on Traffic and Parking that only considered the bus system's contribution to traffic problems on
The Omaha study criticized the committee for not acknowledging the large degree in which the bus system contributes to 8,000 passengers every school day.
IT COMMENDED the administration,
for indirectly assisting the system
See BUSES page seven
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN-
News Capsules From the Associated Press. United Press International
Panel to track alleged spy
WASHINGTON—The Senate Intelligence Committee will look into the reported disappearance of a former U.S. Army sergeant allegedly involved in intelligence activities by an American officials during negotiations on the canal treaty.
A committee spokesman resigned to comment on reports that the committee planned to subpoena the unidentified exservent and his military record. CBS reported yesterday that the commissioner was planning an honorable discharge in August, left for Panama last week.
The Carter administration plans to take its fight for approval of the Panama Canal treaty to Congress today as the committee that must ratify it begins hearings on relinquishing control of the waterway.
Biko mourners. police clash
KING WILLIAM'S TOWN, South Africa - Angry-backs, among about 20,000 mourners returning from a peaceful open-air funeral for black leader Steve Blake, clashed with officers and stoned two black officers to death, police reported.
The Division Police Commission said police in the segregated township of Mdantsane opened fire to disperse rioting crowds and wounded two blacks. The violence led the government fervor at Bikol's sports stadium.
Selassie
Maddox suffers heart attack
ATLANTA-Lester Maddox, the former Georgia governor who attracted national attention as a segregationist resturant, was in critical condition last night after suffering a heart attack.
Maddox recently began a nightclub career in a two-man act with a young black man who once washed dishes in one of the bars.
Maddox, 61, preceded President Jimmy Carter as Georgia governor in the late 1960s. He also served as Carter's lieutenant governor from 1971 to 1974, and the twoffen feuded publicly.
Ethiopian exiles reach U.S. safety
Their arrival ended an undercover journey across Europe and the Atlantic that had its roots in the overthrow of the Selassie reign.
Still imprisoned in Ethiopia, his fate uncertain, is their father.
Israel approves proposal
JERUSALEM-Israel yesterday announced approval of what it said was a four-point U.S. compromise proposal to reconvene the Geneva Middle East peace conference with a single all-Arab delegation at the opening ceremony.
Under the proposal, the formal opening would be followed by working-group talks between Israel and individual countries. Palestinians—but not known members of the Israeli military (who know JORDAN—would be included among Jordan's representatives.
A senior foreign ministry officer in Cairo said Egypt was unlikely to accept a plan that did not allow the PLO to attend a meeting.
Locally...
KU students, perhaps unknowingly, are a leading cause of problems in the deteriorating neighborhood east of campus, today's Kansan lead editorial says. It is time for students to realize their role in the decline and to support restoration efforts of the Oread Neighborhood Association. See the lead editorial page four.