using fluoride,encouraged acceptance and use of fluoride, and sought to overcome public resistance tofluoride (Coffel). From 1953 till 1977 the only debates going on about fluoridation was how to fundit. Most organizations supported fluoridation, and those that did not soon did, including,the National Research Council, the American Water Works Association, the AmericanMedical Association, and the World Health Organization. All of these organizationsendorsed fluoridation (Waldbott pg. 277). However in 1977, the fluoridation controversy was brought back up by JohnYiamouyiannis. A committee was commissioned to clear up the fluoride controversy onceand for all. But it did not, it just raised it even more. Yiamouyiannis led this committee. Yiamouyiannis in his statement to congress referring to the results the committeegathered, said: “provide clear evidence that fluoride is a carcinogen”. In his studyYiamouyiannis learned that people living in the nation’s ten largest fluoridated citiessuffered 15 percent more cancer than those living in the ten largest non-fluoridated cities. Backing up this report was senior science advisor for the Environmental ProtectionAgency, William L. Marcus. He stated that the committee report not only overlookedliver cancer evidence, but also would have reported clear evidence of carcinogenicity, hadthey not fallen to pressure from pro-fluoride groups to release a “sanitized” report(Coffel). In 1978 Dr. Wallace Armstrong, Dr. Robert Hoover, and Dr. Stephen Barretpublished a two part report on fluoridation for “Consumer Reports”. These two articleswere meant to discredit Yiamouyiannis’ findings that fluoridation is linked to cancer. Theauthors deliberately lied and slandered Yiamouyiannis, so that the general public wouldfeel safe, after all, by now the majority of water supplies in the country had beenfluoridated. This battle waged on for several years, with...
