In your editorial, “The lead lurking in our water,” and in the recent overwhelming media coverage about lead in our drinking water, I find no mention of the role fluoride plays in this process. In controlled laboratory experiments fluoride combined with chlorine increased the leaching of lead from pipes and fittings used in plumbing (Maas RP et al. 2007).
The vast majority of the drinking water supplied to Snohomish County residents has both of these chemicals added. You may remember that the city of Everett, the supplier of water to most of Snohomish County, had to shut down its fluoride adding process for a number of days not too long ago to repair the extensive damage done to their system by the chemicals it was adding to the water.
Most countries do not add fluoride to their water. China is one of those countries. What do they do with their industrial waste called fluoride? They sell it to us.
My favorite quote from John Wayne: “Life is tough. It’s even tougher if you’re stupid.”
Fred C. Howard
Snohomish
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