The Connection Between Acne and Fluoride with Melissa Gallico

Dr. Cates: Hi there. I’m Dr Trevor Cates. Welcome to The Spa Dr. Podcast. On today’s podcast, we’re discussing what might seem like an unlikely connection, acne and fluoride. This is a really fascinating interview. It’s definitely not a topic we’ve ever covered on the spa doctor podcast, and if you struggle with acne or you know anyone that struggles with acne, this is an interview I’d really like you to watch. My guest today is Melissa Gallico. She is the author of The Hidden Cause of Acne and F is for Fluoride. She is a former military intelligence officer, fulbright scholar and intelligence specialist at the Federal Bureau of Investigation where she instructed classes for FBI analysis of Quantico and provided analytical support for national security investigations. She graduated with honors from Georgetown University and has a Master’s Degree with the University of St Andrews in Scotland. She has her own personal journey with being exposed to fluoride and what she noticed with her own skin and acne and she makes some really interesting in this interview she makes some really interesting correlations, shares a lot about the research on an element, fluoride that you might be surprised to learn about the possible toxicity and the possible impact that it might be playing in your health and your skin, so please enjoy this interview. Melissa, welcome. It’s so great to have you on the podcast.

Melissa: Thanks for having me. So excited to speak with you

Dr. Cates: Now you’ve made an interesting connection that a lot of people aren’t aware of or talking about and that is the connection between fluoride being the cause of acne. And so how did you come to find this connection?

Melissa: It took a long time. I had acne for 20 years off and on depending on where I lived and that was the big clue for me. My background is in national security, so I used to live in a lot of different countries and I noticed that in certain countries my skin was effortlessly clear, but whenever I came back to the United States, even for a brief visit, even no matter where I was living in the US, I would start to develop these painful cystic outbreaks mostly along my jaw and around my mouth. And after about 20 years of this going on, I finally figured it out. It was the fluoride added to the water supply.

Dr. Cates: That’s amazing. And so, so let’s, let’s start with Florida. Let’s talk a little bit about fluoride and where it comes from, why it’s in the water so that people know that people think about it with toothpaste, but, and I think most people know it’s added to water, but maybe you can explain a little bit about, about fluoride and why it’s in the water and why maybe it was an issue in some countries than others.

Melissa: Sure. It comes from a lot of different places. And I originally just always use fluoridated toothpaste. I always drank fluoridated water and I had the treatment at the dentist twice a year. And I just assumed that it was good for me. And I never even heard of the controversy around fluoride until I was living in Scotland, which is a country that 97 percent of the public is against fluoridation. They’re very anti fluoride. They’ve never really fluoridated there. There’s been a few small cities. Um, but that’s the first I’d ever heard of it and my skin was clear. There are no issues. I was in my mid thirties at this point and when I moved back to the US right away, I started developing that same painful cystic acne and it just did not make sense to me. Um, and then I started researching where the fluoride in the water comes from and why do they do this? And that’s when I realized it wasn’t what I thought I always thought it was because they were trying to help people, um, you know, their dental health or to prevent cavities. And there’s actually a much deeper story there involving pollution. It was the leading airborne pollutant in the mid 20th century, the time when fluoridation was introduced because it’s a common element in the Earth’s crust and when these corporations are mining different elements from the earth crust, like aluminum, aluminum was a big, big one. Um, they were mining a lot of aluminum for world war two. It was being. Fluoride was being emitted into the atmosphere as a result of that because it’s a byproduct. They didn’t need the fluoride. And it was causing a lot of damage to livestock, agriculture and human health as well, and they were facing lawsuits. So these corporate polluters hired researchers to look into fluoride and tell us that it’s good for us, you know they literally, that’s what their purpose was, find a good use for fluoride. And those are the researchers that suggested putting, putting it in the water supply. So the fluoride added to water, over 90 percent of it is fluorosilicic acid, which is a byproduct of phosphate, fertilizer, mining, and you can call your local water supplier and ask them where the fluoride added to water comes from. And most likely they’ll tell you it’s a company in Florida that minds phosphate fertilizer. So that was shocking to me. I thought it was a pharmaceutical grade sodium fluoride that they were putting in the water, but it wasn’t. There’s much more to that story. And um, it’s really a US story. The US is the one that had been in public water fluoridation and we’ve pushed it out to our allies as such a great thing. So the English speaking world tends to fluoridate Canada, Australia and New Zealand, parts of the UK, not Scotland, but Ireland does. And then there’s a few other places like Brazil and maybe a few pockets in Spain, but for the most part those are the countries that fluoridate.

Dr. Cates: Oh Wow. And I’ve heard this before, but it’s really interesting to bring this back up and, and look at the connection between what it might be doing to our health. And you mentioned that there are different forms of fluoride. Is there, are there some types actually good for us. I mean with the research that was done on fluoride and preventing tooth decay is, is there validity to that? I mean it seems like there, there is some validity to that, but is it the forum or what is this all just a big lie?

Melissa: The science on fluoride is so difficult to sort through because of all the different interests involved. And so originally they thought that that fluoride prevented cavities by ingesting it and that’s why they put it in the water supply. Well, after that they kind of discovered, well actually it doesn’t work by ingesting it, it’s just topical, but fluoridation is still good because you know, you’re drinking water and it’s like covering your tooth enamel, you know, while you’re drinking it. So they never stopped fluoridation when they changed their mind about the causal mechanism behind how fluoride prevents cavities. So that was a little strange. Um, some dentists and some researchers think it purely works through like varnishes and toothpaste and that’s all you need. You don’t need fluoridated drinking water and then you have another camp that says we don’t need fluoride at all. What we need to do is look at nutrition and look at restricting sugar in the Diet and increasing the amount of minerals and nutrients and the foods that we’re eating. So there’s a lot of different schools of thought. I don’t know if we’ll be able to figure them out until we get this corporate interest out of the science.

Dr. Cates: Right. And I, you know, as a naturopathic physician, I’m always more of a root cause person and we don’t have a deficiency in fluoride and that’s why we need to supplement with Florida. I mean there’s, there’s absolutely no evidence of that. So why would we, why would that be our primary way of preventing tooth decay and cavities? I, it’s just, it, it always has baffled me and whenever I’ve taken my kids or even myself for myself going into the dentist, I’ve always turned that down and they always look at me like I’m crazy. Why would you deprive your child with this? And I’m like, what? What research do you have that this actually works. And then, and then I had some dentists, I would say like you’re saying, well actually it’s really mostly the topical, so doing mouth rinses and the toothpaste and things it doesn’t need to be adjusted, but really is such a still a divided thing depending on who you talk to, what, which dental, which dentist you talked to. It’s such a variety of information. So I really would love some clarity on that. But as far as the form of the fluoride, is there any association with that? I mean what is the difference with those?

Melissa: So usually when it’s naturally occurring, it’s bound with another mineral, like calcium or magnesium and when they mine it from the Earth’s crust they’re tearing this apart, you know they’re keeping the aluminum or they’re keeping the phosphate and they’re making the fluoride, you know, separate. And so when you know, some water supplies are naturally high in fluoride and usually they have these other minerals as well that makes the fluoride less bio available. I will still have a reaction to naturally occurring fluoride in the water supply. I lived in Jacksonville for a period of time and they have naturally occurring fluoride because they have very deep aquifers and that is usually where the fluoride comes from. So about a hundred years ago, they built these very deep aquifers that weren’t susceptible to sea salt water contamination as much. That’s why they did that and that’s when they started having so much fluoride in their water. It’s the same rock or the phosphate fertilizer mining is happening. So it’s. It’s the same element. It’s just surrounded by different elements. So there is a big difference. I did my breakouts there weren’t nearly as bad as when I lived in places that had artificially fluoridated water and I don’t know if that’s because the level was different. Um, so Jacksonville is around point seven or one parts per million. I lived in Delray Beach, Florida and they fluoridated at one point two parts per million at the time and that was the worst my skin had ever been. So I’m not really sure if it’s because it was artificial fluoride or because the level was higher, but another place I lived in Newport, Rhode Island 15 years before that and that was artificially fluoridated and my skin was the worst of the area, you know, those were the two worst places. So I think artificially fluoridated water is not, you know, it’s not as easy for your body to handle as naturally fluoridated water, but I don’t think either of them is desirable.

Dr. Cates: Right. And maybe the benefit of naturally occurring fluoride is actually, like you said, if it has calcium or magnesium bound to it, then maybe the benefits are actually from those minerals. Not The fluoride, but I’m not sure if that’s actually been looked at, but that’s something to consider as well. But certainly the form of the artificial, the fact that where it comes from is really disturbing. And I think most people don’t even know how toxic that could potentially be.

Melissa: So this is a hazardous material when they transport it to your water supplier? It’s transported as a Hazmat and those water suppliers that are working on it, your utility workers, they are risking their health. There have been people that have been seriously damaged by this chemical. It will eat through concrete. They dilute it when they put it in your water supply, but it’s very dangerous to handle it.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. And you, you know, when you look at toothpaste and it has fluoride in it and has, um, a warning of ingestion, that’s always, you know, shocked me too. Why we would, why we would have something used in toothpaste and have our children ingest it because kids, you know, they swallows stuff and then you know, the fluoride tablets. I’ve always been confused by that. So let’s get back to acne because this is, this is really kind of a newer thing that a lot of people aren’t aware of. And so you noticed it for yourself and then what else have you noticed? Do other people have the same issue?

Melissa: Yeah, so first when I figured it out. I thought I have this weird allergy. I wrote a very short pdf file. I put it on the Internet for free. I didn’t have like a newsletter or anything. I just said if you have this weird allergy, here’s how I fixed it. And I just started hearing from people and I thought I was looking at the number of people who are downloading it and then the number of people I was hearing from who were able to clear their acne and I was. I was thinking, this is weird. Why am I hearing from all these people? And then one woman wrote to me and said, your book saved my life. I never would have figured this out. And it was driving me crazy and I thought I need to turn this into an actual book. So I wrote a book and I put it on Amazon. Just self published it. I thought, you know, if people are really searching for answers, they’ll look on Amazon. And I just started hearing from people with these amazing stories, like people who had had acne for 30 years and finally fixed it by getting rid of fluoride. And so then it was picked up by a publisher and that’s how it came to be. And when I did the research for the official book and started looking at the literature on acne, I realized fluoride is all written all over it. It’s just between the lines. Like I saw so many studies where if they had known about the fluoride connection, the study makes sense. So that’s what I incorporated into the book. Um, I’m not the first person to put this together. I thought originally like I was, did I figure out this new theory? But I was reading a book by an allergist from the sixties, and he was talking about fluoride and acne, and his book is called a struggle with titans. His name was George Wald, but he was the allergist who figured out the connection between Emphysema and smoking. So he was very well respected. He was published in all kinds of journals, but when he started researching fluoride and the negative effects of fluoride, he couldn’t get anybody to listen. He couldn’t get his, his double blind placebo controlled studies published and he couldn’t find anyone to take him seriously. So that’s why his book is called Struggle with Titans because fluoride is just such a controversial topic, it’s really hard to get this information out there. Wow, that’s amazing. And then, so when you’re talking about the studies, they’re, the studies are out there, there are there studies that say fluoride causes acne or you. When you, what do you mean by reading between the lines? Sort of. So what I mean by that is when I looked at the literature on acne, I could see all of these signs of the fluoride was the main player for example. Um, they didn’t really, dermatologists didn’t really research diet in the 20th century. It was all about pills and creams and needles and things like that. Um, when Dr Loren Cordain put out his article, acne vulgaris a disease of western civilization that really shook things up a little bit because he was looking at societies that didn’t get acne and he was hypothesizing it was because of their diet. So dermatologist, hated this idea about diet and acne, they’re like, we can’t do anything about it anyway. We need something we can actually help with, you know, because people will eat what they want to eat. But, um, when he published that article with some of his colleagues, it made them, you know, it got their attention. Um, but when you look at that article, he is hypothesizing that it’s because of sugar, that these societies don’t eat sugar as much as we do. But if you look at it with the fluoride Lens, they also have diets that are very low and fluoride. And, um, Dr Cordain became interested in acne because he read this article, uh, by, uh, an Eskimo frontier physician Otto Shaffer. He wrote it in the seventies and it’s called When the Eskimo Comes to Town and he was talking about when the Eskimo comes to town, they develop acne and all of these other diseases, cardiovascular disease, and um, Dr Cordain read this. Any thought? Huh? That’s interesting. You know, it’s because they change their diet and they’re eating sugar. But I read that original article by Otto Shaffer and he said it’s the acne is particularly on the streets of larger towns. They don’t get it on the smaller towns and he names three towns. So I called those towns and I said, when did you start fluoridating? And it was in the sixties, 10 years before auto shapers article is written. So that’s what I mean by looking between the lines because when you read that article, it makes perfect sense why there would be a lot of acne on the streets of larger towns and not the smaller city centers.

Dr. Cates: Yeah, that’s interesting. I, I was um, I was in Uganda recently and I was noticing as someone who specializes in the skin, I couldn’t help but notice how beautiful their skin is and nobody had acne. Nobody, not a single person and I saw thousands of people because it’s quite populated country. There are 40 million people in that country or the people everywhere and I never saw acne and I, and I didn’t think about that. Well, I, I immediately thought about the diet and that they really don’t have much in the way of sugar, but they do have sodas and occasional treats, but it’s just not part of most of most people’s daily lives. So that’s what I was thinking about. I didn’t really think about the fluoride, but I wonder if it could perhaps be a combination of the two because we definitely have seen the research show a connection between the high glycemic index foods and um, and acne breakouts. But now I want to go back and look at some of that research and see where do those people live. And

Melissa: Yeah. So when, when you read those studies, they, they, um, he has like a table of the foods that the two groups were given. And a lot of the foods that are in the low glycemic diet also happened to be low in fluoride. Like whenever you cook rice or mashed potatoes in fluoridated water, they will be high and fluoride and even breakfast, cereal box, breakfast cereal, if it’s manufactured with fluoridated water, the fluoride concentrates in the cereal so it will be high fluoride. So they were eliminating things like that and I was pointing out like, wow, this diet is much lower and fluoride and that’s why in these studies they never clear their acne completely because they’re still drinking fluoridated water, but they see a dramatic reduction. So that’s my theory that it’s because even in those studies about the low glycemic diet, it’s because of the difference in fluoride.

Dr. Cates: Right. And and juice is another one when juices. A lot of times, juices aren’t 100 percent juice. They’re diluted with water and a lot of times the water, the water that’s added is fluoridated water. I know that that’s been a big source for people to. Right?

Melissa: Yes. And grape juice, which a lot of times they’ll add grape juice to all different kinds of juices that aren’t actually grape juice. Grape juice can be especially high end fluoride because it’s a common pesticide use on grapes.

Dr. Cates: Oh, that’s why. Okay. I thought maybe it was added because I knew that about grape juice that it was high in Florida. Interesting. Um, so now with Florida we haven’t in our tap water, so we’re showering with it. We’re bathing with it and so we’re getting it topically as well as in the drinking water, unless, I mean, unless we filter out, which we can talk about. But so is it isn’t an only internal thing or is it externally too? That’s part of the issue.

Melissa: I think both. But for me internally was the bigger problem. I was able to. I wasn’t able to heal my skin completely until I moved to a non fluoridated house and I don’t know if that’s because I just hadn’t had enough time to get it out of my system. Um, but after that I moved back to a fluoridated neighborhood and I was able to maintain clear skin even though I showered in fluoridated water and I wash my hands in Florida and water. But I would use bottled water for my face. And I drank low fluoride water, so I, it’s possible to live in a fluoridated neighborhood, shower and fluoridated water and still I’m still have clear skin. So for me the Diet was the big thing. I did try to limit the time in the shower. I tried not to take super hot showers because all the steam and just like, you know, opening up your pores and getting more exposure to fluoride. So I did try to, you know, I didn’t take baths in Florida, added water, but um, but I was able to have clear skin even though the water is fluoridated.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. And so drinking filtered water, making sure that the foods that you’re purchasing to don’t aren’t made with fluoridated water. I mean those are some of the things that people can do.

Melissa: Yeah. I always suggest starting with toothpaste and water because those are two easy sources to change. Switching to a natural toothpaste or fluoride free toothpaste. And then figuring out if your water does contain fluoride. And if so, looking for an option that’s fluoride free. And then after that, if you see a big change, if you notice a reduction, you can root out all of the other smaller sources. Um, things like black tea is a common one because tea happens to be the only edible plant that uptake’s fluoride and large amounts from the soil. So if you’re drinking tea every day, um, you know, that could definitely be a culprit for acne. And then, um, we mentioned like grape products, so wine, raisins, you know, anything from that one area of California where they use fluoride based pesticides can be very high in fluoride and then poultry products are also high in fluoride because just like with humans, it accumulates in their bones and they can put a lot of fluoride based pesticides on poultry feed. I think the limit is 113 parts per million, which are water is point seven parts per million. So it is a lot of fluoride on poultry feed. It accumulates in their bones. And some of my worst breakouts were from things like chicken soup or, um, any kind of mechanically deboned cultural product like chicken nuggets that can have one serving of chicken nuggets can have, um, the upper safe limit of fluoride for a child. So definitely something to look out for. You want organic poultry. And then there’s other random sources like pharmaceuticals, a lot of pharmaceuticals are made with fluoride and chemical products like keyboard cleaners. There’s a lot of fluorinated chemicals, so I think mostly it’s the water and the toothpaste and then foods in your diet. And then maybe depending on your situation, you might have a few other sources that you’ll need to root out as well.

Dr. Cates: Right. And then also when you go into the dentist office, I think a lot of dentists just assume that it’s okay to use fluoride in the products that they’re using. So if you’re getting, um, are you or your kids are getting a treatment right? You’ll want to make sure that you tell the dentist that you’re fluoride free

Melissa: and yes, that is an optional treatment and you don’t have to pay for that. And you could, I’ve been finding dentists, holistic dentist, you know, if you look up the international association of oral medicine and toxicology, they have a lot of great dentists who are very well educated on fluoride and they won’t even try to put it on your teeth. So that’s usually where I like to recommend people go to find a dentist.

Dr. Cates: Right, right. Good. Um, but going back to food, I see it sounds like if you’re choosing organic, that does reduce a lot of it. So there are organic wines there or organic juices and um, grapes and it is and grapes are known to be, especially U.S. Grown grapes, one of the most pesticide written as what’s called the dirty dozen by Environ environmental working group usually shows up as one of the highest pesticide residue foods our produce. So it’s important to get grapes organic anyway. Right. And then if you’re talking about a juice and and definitely like you said, look at the ingredients. It just because it’s not grape juice, a lot of times things are sweetened with grape juice is a natural sweetener. And in the natural food stores and cookies and all kinds of things are sweetened with grape juice as a, as a form of sweetener.

Melissa: When I started researching grape products, I went down such a rabbit hole because of raisins. Raisins are a big one to look out for and I know you’re a dog lover so you might be interested in this, but raisins, half the world’s raisin supply is grown in one valley in California. San Joaquin Valley grows half the world’s raisin supply and it’s because of these like very outdated laws from World War II. We had a national raisin reserve for for decades following World War Two and they grew all of these raisins. The government would take the excess and sell them on the foreign market. And so because of that, because of that, the way raisins are farmed in the US, they had to use really strong pesticides. And I started researching that because I thought, I wonder if anybody’s looked into dogs who die from raisin toxicosis, if that is possibly fluoride poisoning. And they have not. But there is so much evidence that these dogs are dying from fluoride toxicity. So I wrote a very long. I ended up taking it out of the book because it was so long. I put it on medium just for people to read. Like I just wanted all the evidence there. Um, I did put a shorter version of it in the finished version of the book, the Hidden Cause of Acne. But I really think these dogs are dying from fluoride toxicity and nobody is monitoring the pesticides that are used on the fluoride based pesticides used on raisins in California. Uh, it was very scary.

Dr. Cates: That’s crazy. So with the, um, what’s the connection between Acne and Florida? Is this something that everybody with acne should look at? Or is this something that only a small group of people have? How common is this? And, and like you said, you thought maybe it was an allergy. What, um, is this something that is really impacting everybody or is it just certain people?

Melissa: I don’t think we’ll know until we have like real studies to show what percentage of acne is caused by fluoride. It’s much more common than I originally thought and I think it is possibly millions of people have this condition, so if you suffer from acne and you’ve tried all different things, I definitely recommend trying it. It’s good for you anyway because you’re reducing your fluoride exposure and you should be able to tell pretty quickly, you know, if your skin is reacting to fluoride. A few signs that you, your particular case might be from fluoride. Um, if you have dental fluorosis. So that was an indicator for me. And what it is, is if you’re exposed to high amounts of fluoride when your teeth are forming. So when you’re a child, you can see it on your tooth enamel. When your permanent teeth come in, it might have like white spots or maybe like opaque spots or in severe cases, brown or black staining on your teeth. This is called dental fluorosis. Any dentist can tell you if you have it or not, and it’s a sign that you’ve had too much fluoride when you were a child. So I have mild dental fluorosis, so that kind of showed that I had too much fluoride in my system and when I was a kid the rates were 20 something percent of adolescents my age had dental fluorosis. The next national surveys that were done like 10 years later, that statistic had doubled and then I just saw a new study that came out earlier this year where they said over 60 percent of the children that they looked at, I think they were teens, like 16 year olds, over 60 percent had dental fluorosis. So if you have that, it’s a sign that you’ve been exposed to too much fluoride. It stays in your body for decades. It has a very long half life. So that’s a sign that you could be struggling with fluoride toxicity. I also had depression, pretty severe depression. That correlated with my acne and actually put it on a chart in the book. It’s like, well, when I lived here I was depressed. When I lived here I was happy and I lived here, I was depressed and I didn’t realize it. At the time I thought I was depressed because I didn’t like my job or you know, something in my personal life, but finally when I came back from Scotland, everything was going right, like I had everything to be happy but I was not happy and my skin was crazy and then that’s when my, my boyfriend at the time was like, you seem to be like depressed the most when your skin is bad. And I was like, no, I’ve had, I’ve had acne for 20 years. I don’t care. I’m so used to it, you know? And then I thought, well maybe there’s something systemic going on and the acne and the depression are both caused by the same thing and fluoride is known to depress your thyroid. It, it throws your whole hormone system out of whack. And I think that’s why there is such a strong correlation in the literature between acne and depression. It’s not that we’re so sad that our skin looks bad. It’s because our hormones are out of whack because of the fluoride toxicity.

Dr. Cates: Right. That was gonna be my next question was what? What are the other health implications with Florida exposure and because I know I’ve, I’ve heard about thyroid and impacting thyroid, so let’s talk a bit more about that so people really understand the toxicity of flora. So it’s if somebody might be watching, well I don’t have acne so I can still consume fluoride in water. So let’s talk though about all the other symptoms because this can also help people fit the pieces of the puzzle together. Solve the mystery of the root cause because if you have acne plus some other symptoms, it could create more of a concern of like, I really need to eliminate fluoride from my consumption.

Melissa: Yeah. There are a lot of other problems with fluoride besides acne. Um, I was speaking with a doctor in Australia recently who used to work for one of these big aluminum polluters and he was, um, an environmental doctor for them. And he said it was very common knowledge that a lot of their workers were suffering from fluoride toxicity. And he said, the ones with skin conditions actually fared better in the longterm because your skin is protecting you, you know, your skin is detoxifying this toxic substance. So people that had skin issues did well in the long run, whereas people that didn’t have skin issues, they were still being exposed to the fluoride. Their body was just reacting to it in different ways. It would be stored in their bone tissue and over long periods of exposure. Fluoride causes skeletal fluorosis, which is very similar to arthritis. And I think a lot of people in the United States who think they have early stages of arthritis actually have early stages of skeletal fluorosis

Dr. Cates: Or osteoporosis. Osteopenia, right?

Melissa: Yeah. Lots of different manifestations of skeletal abnormalities or skeletal problems. Um, people, skeletal fluorosis is only diagnosed if the person has like excessive tea consumption, then the doctor might think, oh, maybe it’s from fluoride, but what if you have excessive exposure to other sources of fluoride? They would never think that it’s skeletal fluorosis. It’s a very common condition in India and China and parts of the world that have high amounts of naturally occurring fluoride. So if the doctors from India, they’re more likely to diagnose it, but doctors here don’t really know about it as much. Um, so that’s one thing to look out for, to keep your bones and joints healthy. You want to avoid fluoride and in the long term, um, and then we talked about depressing the thyroid, do it, will, um, contribute to hypothyroidism. So that is an epidemic in our culture of millions of people suffer from that and they’re literally putting a thyroid depressant in the water supply. So it makes sense that we have so many people suffering from that condition.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. Yeah. And I wonder too, if it’s contributing to the increase in autoimmune thyroid disease to that we’re seeing because of the impact it can have on the immune system to.

Melissa: Yeah. That for me, the scariest part about fluoride is the, all the studies that are coming out recently about the neurotoxic effects of fluoride for the developing brain. So that is very concerning. Um, there’s been, there was a Meta analysis that Harvard researchers did and they said there is a strong, strong possibility that fluoride is a neurotoxin. And they said it should be a high research priority, so the national toxicology program set out to do a study. Now of course it takes like decades for them to like do, do these studies and right away they start releasing things and you’ll see a statement from the Ada, the American Dental Association saying, Oh, see, we told you it was perfectly safe, but we haven’t really taken our time and taken this question seriously of whether fluoride is a developmental neurotoxin. There are studies showing a correlation between rates of Adhd and rates of fluoridation and certain demographic areas. It’s a huge concern. Um, so that to me is, is the most troubling aspect because it’s affecting our future generations.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. Okay. So let’s go back to the two places you said to start because I know there’s going to be a little overwhelmed. I’m like, oh my God. Plummeted questions for me. Let’s go back to the two main sources, which is toothpaste and water. So if you can see it says right on the label, fluoride-free. That’s an easy one, right? Very easy. Pretty easy. You can order these toothpastes online if you don’t have a health food store and your area, even some grocery stores and pharmacies and things like that, they’ll have fluoride free toothpaste. Right? So that’s pretty easy to find, right? Um, so then, but then water gets a little bit trickier. How do you know, I mean, is fluoridated water across United States and every town and city, I mean obviously this has well water then it’s not going to be necessarily an issue, but, but let’s talk about that.

Melissa: Yeah. Um, so 70 percent of the US population drinks fluoridated water. You can call your water supplier and ask them. They should be able to tell you over the phone or you could google the name of your town and the words water quality report and that will bring up their annual water quality report, which they’re required to provide to you. And you can look for fluoride on there and it should say, um, you want to see ND which means not detected or anything under point one, part per million. That’s very low trace amount of fluoride. So that’s a good thing. Dentists right now are recommending point seven parts per million Fluoride, they used to recommend up to one point two, but when the dental fluorosis rates started skyrocketing, they reduced it to point seven. So if you see point seven, um, that probably means they’re artificially fluoridating or maybe it’s naturally occurring, uh, you can call and ask or it might be written on the report where they get the fluoride from.

Dr. Cates: Right? So even if it’s not added to the water, it still could be in the water. So someone has, um, well, water, it could still be in that because of pesticides, right? Well,

Melissa: Well water, it, it could be from a lot of different sources. All the fluoride we’re adding to the water supply has to go somewhere. So it’s accumulating in our, in our environment. So a lot of times usually fresh water wells, like surface wells aren’t usually high in fluoride. Usually it’s the very deep wells that’ll be high fluoride, but they could be. And that’s why the CDC recommends having your well tested every three years for fluoride.

Dr. Cates: Right, right. I think it’s good. I think it’s good to test while water. I think some people that are on well water, they think, oh my water’s clean because it’s, you know, my own water. But the water veins that feed into it, you know water comes from all over the place. Um, so that’s important. And then bottled water can still contain fluoride. Right? Which is kind of surprising.

Melissa: Yeah, it can. I’m usually, it doesn’t, but um, they have to put it on there if they add it, it has to say so on the label. So you’ll know if it’s added because it’ll be very clear, um, sometimes they, you know, some of these water companies are just taking tap water, maybe running it through a filter and putting it in a bottle for you. Um, so the same thing applies to bottled water. You can google the name of the company and water quality report and you should be able to find their water quality report as well, or call the manufacturer to see if their water contains fluoride.

Dr. Cates: Okay. Now I always think the best option is to have a home filtration system. Um, I in my home, I have a reverse osmosis filter for drinking and then I have a whole house filtration system so that even the water that I’m showering, bathing in and the family is bathing in that that’s clean because I live in Park City, Utah, which is a mining town. Where as you know, as you know, there are a lot of issues of, of all the different leftover components of, uh, of mining silver mining. So I think it’s really, I go to the extreme and uh, I don’t know that everybody needs to do that, but what do you think at the very least, what do people need to be, what kind of filter do they need to be using on their drinking water?

Melissa: At the very least, having a, I think reverse osmosis is usually the one that I recommend because it’s pretty reliable at removing fluoride. I’ve seen this disturbing trend where people are buying pitchers, you know, filtered pitchers that filter your water and a lot of times the manufacturer will say it removes 90 percent of fluoride, but that might be true for a day or for two days, but those filters very quickly wear out and within a week you’re drinking the same amount of fluoride as if you never filtered it. So reverse osmosis as much more reliable. There are other methods. Bone Char filters are very effective at removing fluoride. There’s activated alumina filters. Um, so there’s different ways you can remove it, but reverse osmosis is readily available and it is reliable.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. And I know that when people look into reverse osmosis is the more expensive version of a water filtration. But if you think about over time, if you’re going to be in your home for a while, it’s a great investment because you’re going to save a lot of money on not having to order a bottle of water or drink, you know, you can fill up your containers and take it with you, which is so much better for the environment too.

Melissa: Yeah, definitely.

Dr. Cates: Um, well great, this has been fascinating. And um, is there anything else you want to share before we go, uh, things that people should be considering with fluoride and acne that we haven’t covered?

Melissa: I think um, just know that it takes some time. When I first eliminated fluoridated water, it didn’t clear my skin completely. I had to stick with it and I would always second guess myself like, oh, this is crazy. It’s not the fluoride. And then I would realize like, oh wow, chicken bones. I did not know that I was always discovering something new so, um, you could get lucky and maybe it’ll clear up within two weeks I’ve heard from people who’ve seen results that quickly, um, but it might take, it might take a little longer to really root out all the hidden sources of fluoride. So just stick at it, um, be uh, and just be persistent with it because I was finally able to get to the point where right now I feel like I control my acne, the dial on a radio, you know, if I, if I decide to be a little lax and go eat at a fluoridated restaurant, you know, I know I know what to avoid there. Or I know that if I give into a food that I know has fluoride, I’m probably going to see a reaction within a few hours and then it goes away. So it is nice to know that I feel like I’m in control of my skin now and it just takes a little time to get there.

Dr. Cates: Yeah, and this goes back to message that I share often is that skin is our magic mirror that gives us great information about what’s going on with our lifestyle, with our overall health. And so for you, it has become this definitely this sign. As soon as you get exposure to fluoride, your skin’s going to let you know. And so it. And it’s actually a really great thing because what’s going on internally in your body you can’t see, but there could be damage going on with the fluoride and because we talked about the other toxicity effects of that, but having that, that outside signal from, from your body is such a great tool that we oftentimes ignore. And so thank you for, um, for taking the charge and writing your book and doing all the work on the research on this. I, I’m excited to see, um, see how this continues to grow and the research unfolding to, to let us know more about this.

Melissa: Me Too. I can’t wait for a dermatologist to take this on. There’s going to be like a trove of good data for whoever does start studying it.

Dr. Cates: Okay, great. So tell everybody where they can find you. Learn more about your book and what the work you’re doing.

Melissa: Sure. The website for the book is TheHiddenCauseOfAcne.com. I have some before and afters and testimonials. And there’s a resource section. If you sign up for the newsletter, it sends you a cheat sheet on the hidden sources of fluoride, the most common sources. Um, and then I just launched a production studio because I’m going to try to end fluoridation. So gallico.co is the website for that. And, and, um, I put my first podcast episode out there, um, and I just want to record conversations with all of these researchers and scientists and activists and all kinds of people who have taken on fluoridation and um, and I want to elevate their voices. So that’s called The Gallico Show. You can find it on iTunes or wherever you listen to podcasts. And, um, and I hope that some of your listeners will get involved in joining the effort because I really think that now is the time to end fluoridation. We tend to think it’s been going on so long, it’s going to go on forever, but everything ends sometime. And I think now just seeing all of the alternative health practitioners who are speaking out about it and just unapologetically talking about the need to end fluoridation and the damaging effects that has, um, I think that that’s going to make a big difference in the next few years. I think it will end.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. I’m, I’m absolutely, I think it’s been, um, I’ve been something that needs to change for a long time and I’m excited to hear that there’s an effort underway or that you’re, you’re leading an effort. Um, I think, um, yeah. And unless somebody comes forward and shows us some really solid evidence that it is doing what it has been claimed to do, which apparently we’re not really seeing that then it’s time. It’s definitely time. Okay. Well thanks again for your interview. I appreciate the information.

Melissa: Thank you. Thank you so much.

Dr. Cates: I hope you enjoyed this interview today with Melissa Gallico and gathered some interesting information about fluoride and it’s possible health effects as well as the impact on the skin. So if you struggle with acne or you know anybody that struggles with acting and wants to, to do this fluoride free for at least two weeks to remove it from your water, to remove it from your toothpaste, at the very least, I’d love to know what kind of results that you’re seeing. I’d love to see this as well, so I’d love your feedback and see what you’re noticing about your skin. So please share with us, contact us at The Spa Doctor or place a comment in the comment section below the spa doctor podcast. Interview on the website or on Youtube and let us know what you’re noticing and I’d love to get your feedback on this and if you haven’t already taken the skin quiz, I encourage you to do that. You can go to TheSkinQuiz.com to find out what messages your Magic Mirror, your skin is trying to tell you about your health and what you can do about it. Just go to TheSkinQuiz.com. Also, I invite you to join me on social media, on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube. And join the conversation and I’ll see you next time on The Spa Dr. Podcast.