Daily Bread

“Give us this day our daily bread?”
© 2003 PFPC

   “In 1970, the canton of Vaud, being the only one with its own salt factory and a cantonal ‘monopoly’ on cantonal salt, began to fluoridate all salt in packages and sacks with 250 ppm fluoride.” (Marthaler, 2000)

   The result? Now virtually ALL foods taken in by the population contained fluoride, including all processed foods, baked goods, foods in canteens, cafeterias, etc. (Marthaler, 2000).

   Baked goods, at 28%, are the greatest individual source of salt intake (k & s, 2000).

   Bread is the largest sector of the European bakery market,with sales of 24.4 million tons in 1999 equating to 81% of total bakery volume (European Bakery Products Market, 2nd Edition).

   Consumption of baked goods is 133 gram per day, per person.

   Bread now contained up to 9 mg of fluoride per kilogram (Menghini et al, 1995).   

   At a fluoride content of 9 mg/kg the above consumption figures translate to a daily intake of 1.2 mg from this source alone.  

REFERENCES:

k+s Annual Report 2000
http://www.k-plus-s.com/pdf_de/2000/info-03.pdf

Macpherson LM, Stephen KW - "The effect on human salivary fluoride concentration of consuming fluoridated salt-containing baked food items" Arch Oral Biol 46(10):983-8 (2001)

Marthaler TM - “Salt fluoridation in Europe, comparisons with Latin America” 8th World Salt Symposium (2000); Volume 2: 1021-1026 (2000)

Menghini GD, Steiner M, Marthaler TM, Bandi A - “Caries occurrence in schoolchildren of the canton of Glarus in 1974 to 1992: the effect of the use of fluoridated salt” Schweiz Monatsschr Zahnmed 105(4):467-73 (1995)

    “Between 1974 and 1976, fluoridated salt (250 ppm F) was introduced in the Swiss Canton of Glarus and has been used since by the bakeries and most households (domestic salt) in the Canton.... 46 to 60% of the bread samples contained between 3 to 9 ppm F; this bread had obviously been produced with fluoridated salt.”