I could understand a product like Soylent adding sodium fluoride to their shakes, after all, they’ve made bad decision after bad decision, from changing their macro nutritional ratios to stupidly high fat levels and minimal protein levels to using soy protein as their main source. Curiously, all these decisions happened after they “sold out” for ~$20 million, but I digress.
I would have not expected in a million years a comparatively small and unknown product like J_o_y_l_e_n_t, to begin adding this poison deliberately to their shakes. Not only the vegan version mind you, but all of them now. At least they have the decency to list it, as opposed to the myriad of products out there that don’t even bother doing so.
I made my peace with having to consume toxic, cancerous substances ubiquitous in everything we eat in modern times; it is either starve or consume them. No alternative, unless you move out of civilization and go live with the Indians. (do tell me if you find a tribe welcoming strangers). But I draw the line with substances that dumb me down and kill the last few remaining good brain cells that I have. No way J_o_y_l_e_n_t!
Thank you very much, but I’m moving to Queal. Too bad I just bought a whole month supply. Guess will have to sell them on ebay for a loss.
I did actually check because Std_vector’s claims seem a bit out of the blue.
But he does have a point, here’s an article discussing it:
A 2 year study on mice with varying results:
“there was equivocal evidence of carcinogenic activity of sodium fluoride in male F344/N rats”
“Dosed rats had lesions typical of fluorosis of the teeth and female rats receiving drinking water containing 175 ppm sodium fluoride had increased osteosclerosis of long bones.”
175 PPM = 175 mg/l in other words: an extreme dosage.
So to be honest Std_vector definitely has a point and Sodium Fluoride shouldn’t just be added to products before we really know how good/harmful it is. On the other hand of all the studies that were done I can’t find one that really proves with certainty that these dosages of fluoride are “bad”.
If I were in charge of the ingredients: I would remove it unless there’s some evidence of positive effects I’m missing but the effect on teeth cavities seems to be minimal as far as I can tell and we already get some Fluoride from the tap water I (and probably most people) use when making our Plenny Shake.
Great questions and good points, thanks for starting this dialogue. Let me start off with a reply on @Std_vector
“to begin adding this poison deliberately to their shakes. Not only the vegan version mind you, but all of them now.”
–> We’ve been using the same basic formula since the beginning of our company three years ago. The use of fluoride is not new, not for our Regular Plenny Shake, nor our Vegan Plenny Shake.
Allow me to explain why there is fluoride in our products:
Fluoride is mainly needed to prevent caries. Fluoride is naturally found in the soil and ends up in groundwater that we drink.
The fluoride concentration in the soil depends on how much calcium there is in the soil (here it is a binding with, the less calcium in the soil, the more fluoride in groundwater), and whether there are fluoride-rich rocks in the ground that releases fluoride. In addition, fluoride can also end up in water through carbon burning that is rich in fluoride. Everywhere on earth the concentrate fluoride in the water is different, on average it is said: countries without fluoride enriched water there is 0.6 mg fluoride per litre of water, and in fluoride enriched water countries it is 2.0 mg fluoride per litre of water. According to the WHO, the overdose was set at more than 1.0 mg fluoride per kg body weight and recommendation is 3.5 mg fluoride per day on average (World Health Organization guideline).
What is known about carcinogenicity and other possible physical effects:
two independent studies in which mice and rats were exposed for a long time are fluoride could not measure a carcinogenic effect of fluoride, see:
WHO 1996 Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality. Volume 2. Health Criteria and Other Supporting Information. 2nd edition, World Health Organization, Geneva
USNRC 1993 Health Effects of Ingested Fluoride. US National Research Council, National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.
Reports have been reported showing that there are negatives on the morphology of reproductive organs and reproductive functions by fluoride, however, this is at a dose of 4.5 mg per kilogram of body weight. But in a recent study no effects were found on the morphology of reproductive organs and reproductive functions, see:
IPCS 2002 Fluorides. Environmental Health Criteria 227.World Health Organization, Geneva
Based on this information and other sources, we have based our addition of fluoride.
Hope this helps! But if you guys have any other questions, please ask away!
Even if fluoride were a safe substance and it had a positive effect on oral health, why get out of your way to add it? Why incur the extra time and expense to procure and mix it when it is already added at the “recommended” levels in the water supply? Do you care about our teeth that much?
Wouldn’t the extra Fluoride in J_o_y_l_e_n_t plus the amount in the water raise the threshold beyond the so called “recommended” levels?
Looking at the ingredients in Queal, reveals they also add Sodium Fluoride. Coincidence? Are all food replacement companies in the Netherlands oral freaks, or is the addition of Sodium Fluoride some sort of requirement by some governmental health agency?
Scientific studies are as valid as the agenda those funding the study are trying to push. For every favorable study on any given subject, you’ll find two negative ones. Very few people actually take the time to carefully read the study and analyze their results. And sometimes the studies are deliberately misleading and omit crucial information.
A user of aluminium foil hat I suppose… Don’t hope a serious debate with people who use essentially Youtube as main documentary source… There is good educational videos, but the fact checking is necessary.
The question remains: why does JimmyJoy add Sodium Fluoride to their product?
Tim tried to answer. He started with: But that’s what we’ve always done!
Great. Not an answer.
Then he added:
Yeah. That’s why Fluoride is added to toothpaste. We get it. No, seriously… we get enough of it already without adding MORE to our food. Maybe that’s why The Netherlands declared fluoridation of drinking water unauthorized and has not done it in any part of the country since 1973.
Tim finished by citing studies that maintain that Fluoride is not toxic ENOUGH to damage reproductive organs. That’s a very specific defense. But OK… it’s only a little bit toxic. So why does JimmyJoy add it to their product?
Saying a product is a “little toxic” is meaningless. Nearly all the product in JJ and any other food are toxic… at a dose. And nearly all are useful for the organism. For instance, copper is needed by our organism but can became toxic at very little dose. Even water can be deadly if you drink too many in short time (and no, it isn’t a joke about drowning).
So no problem to have a rational discussion about the utility of the fluoride in JJ, or even his potential toxicity due to an accumulation with others sources. But a prerequisite is the understanding that one can very rarely consider a product as being essentially toxic.
You make a good point, @arnaud.legue: too much of anything is bad for you. That goes for fluoride, copper, and even water. Totally agreed. But not related to my point at all.
My simple question is: Why does JimmyJoy proactively add Fluoride to their products?
I asked this two weeks ago and others have been asking for a lot longer. Still no answer from the people who made the conscious decision to add this to their product.
The one dubious health benefit that anyone can claim is that fluoride helps prevent tooth decay. Even if this were true, we already have fluoride in our toothpaste. We’re already covered. Fluoride is a highly toxic substance that has been banned from public water supplies in many countries including Holland where JimmyJoy is produced.
Asking for the purported health benefits of calcium is trivial. Same for copper, manganese, magnesium, iron, and zinc. Why is fluoride added to JimmyJoy products? That is my only question.
@Tim already answered this question. There is recommended absorption dose of fluoride per day. It is a nutriment. Our body use it, as copper and others. So when you says there is no answer, you are dishonest.
I was under the impression that I answered your question earlier @joshzam but if not I apologize! In any case, the short answer is that we follow European and worldwide government authority guidelines for what a healthy diet consists of (in fact it’s what our product is pretty much entirely based on) and fluoride just so happens to be part of that.
