FAN Bulletin 873

August 26, 2007

Dear All,

Last year, at the FAN conference, we instigated the annual Albert W. Burgstahler Scientific Integrity ward. Our first winner was man whose name appears on the award – Dr. Albert W. Burgstahler.

Determining this year’s winner of this award was very difficult because there are a number of highly deserving candidates. In the end we have decided to give this award – which sadly carries no monetary value – to two people whose lives and careers exemplify scientific integrity and who have made gigantic efforts to end the sorry practice of fluoridation. These two are Dr. J. William Hirzy and Dr. Robert Carton.

Bill Hirzy’s contribution to scientific integrity goes well beyond the issue of fluoridation. According to Dwight Welch, his colleague at the union (National Treasury Employees Union 280) which represents professional employees at the EPA’s headquarters in Washington DC, “Bill had been pushing our union to get the EPA to adopt the Principles of Scientific Integrity (PSI) before I met him 19 years ago. In fact our union was founded on the idea.”

Dwight continues:

“During the Reagan Regime, when politics started bending science at EPA, Bill got together with Bob Carton, Bill Coniglio and some other scientists to brain storm how scientific integrity could be protected at EPA. They initially thought some sort of scientific society within EPA, but then decided that such a society would have no legal clout so they formed a Union. Bill put PSI (a much stronger version than the current one) into negotiations for the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). He since also tried to get them into subsequent CBAs, but management wouldn’t budge.

However, during the Clinton Administration, when Carol Browner was Administrator, we started something called the National Partnership Council. Bill was NTEU 280’s (then NFFE 2050) rep and he worked with the ORD management partner (Mike Moore) to make it a joint NTEU-ORD project. After much work, a version was approved and acknowledged by Administrator Browner. After George Bush II took over the US presidency, Bill also pushed for acknowledgement by the subsequent Administrators including Christine Whitman, Mike Leavitt, and Stephen Johnson. I believe he was successful with all three. Certainly Whitman and Johnson. Leavitt was here only a short time, so I’m not certain about that.

Working with ORD, Bill got developed an actual PSI training course on the net and scientists were encouraged to take the course.

Sadly, EPA only gives lip service to PSI, but that is certainly not Bill’s fault. You can EPA Union Calls for Moratorium on Water Fluoridation”.

This video can also be accessed from our home page – see item 4, ONLINE VIDEOS. Over 4000 people have accessed this video on Google.

Congratulations Bill Hirzy. If you wish to add your own personal congratulations Bill’s email address is jwhirzy@gmail.com.

As you have seen from Dwight’s comments above, Dr. Robert Carton was also involved in the forming of the Union to represent professional employees at the EPA and for the same reason – the push for scientific integrity. Bob has never been frightened of using the F–words – F for fluoridation and F for fraud. With good reason. Bob was around when the US EPA established the fraudulent “safe” drinking water goal (MCLG) of 4 ppm. Bob spoke first hand with the EPA scientist who had to write this into law, knowing full well it could not be defended scientifically. Now 22 years later Bob is still using the F-word and
had the joy of having his position partially vindicated when the NRC panel in March 2006 recommended to the EPA Water Division that it should lower that standard. I say partially because Bob believes that they had every right to recommend a new MCLG, but succumbed to EPA pressures not to do so. “Leave it to us,” said that EPA and sixteen months later they have done nothing!

Bob has also helped communities up and down the country fight fluoridation proposals and he continues to eloquently articulate the arguments against fluoridation whenever he gets the opportunity. The latest being his appearance on the local ABC-TV program out of the Washington, DC area on August 9. That program hooked his comments to the announcement of the Professionals’ Statement calling for an end to fluoridation and calling for Congressional hearings (see our home page for a transcript and link to the broadcast http://www.FluorideAction.net ).

If you haven’t yet read Bob’s analysis of why the new MCLG – based upon the findings of the NRC (2006) report - must be set at ZERO, for a pdf copy of the article he wrote for the quarterly journal Fluoride. For his many other contributions and writings go to our home page and type in “Carton” in the search button.

If you wish to Congratulate Bob for receiving this FAN award please email him at bobcarton@verizon.net.

So congratulations to both Dr. J. William Hirzy and Dr. Robert Carton for being the 2007 winners of FAN’s Albert W. Burgstahler Scientific Integrity Award. Thank you both for doing so much to uphold scientific integrity in the nation’s capital and throughout the country, not only on fluoridation but wherever science is misused by government agencies.

In that latter pursuit we urge those who haven’t yet done so to sign the ONLINE MESSAGE to congress calling for Congressional hearings where both EPA and CDC officials will have to testify under oath as to why they they continue, on the one hand, to drag their feet on determining a new MCLG, and continue to ignore the health warnings in the NRC (2006) report, on the other. Signing and sending the online message is easy, quick and important to do. Simply go to the top item on our home page at http://www.FluorideAction.net

As of now the total number of signers is 880. Below Jason Krueger has reported the numbers by state at a total of 852 signers and happily reports that now every state has at least one signer. This means that barring blocking mechanisms every US senator has now had this message from at least one of his or her constituents. Well done everyone.

It is still early days and many of the state totals are such that a determined individual reaching out to friends, family and colleagues can easily promote their state up this “league” table by as much ten places.

Paul Connett
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ONLINE MESSAGE STATE TOTALS

This list below now has 852 USA signers. The number in parenthesis was the state total at the last count.

(89) 124 CALIFORNIA

(54) 67 NEW YORK

(41) 57 FLORIDA

(35) 46 WASHINGTON

(26) 43 OREGON

(29) 42 TEXAS

(17) 27 MICHIGAN

(21) 24 ARKANSAS

(20) 24 OHIO

(17) 23 MINNESOTA

(17) 22 ILLINOIS

(17) 22 COLORADO

(16) 21 ARIZONA

(15) 20 HAWAII

(17) 20 MASSACHUSETTS

(15) 18 GEORGIA

(11) 18 PENNSYLVANIA

(12) 17 MISSOURI

(12) 15 KANSAS

(14) 15 UTAH

(10) 13 NORTH CAROLINA

(8) 11 MARYLAND

(9) 11 MONTANA

(3) 11 NEW JERSEY

(9) 11 VIRGINIA

(6) 9 SOUTH CAROLINA

(9) 9 TENNESSEE

(8) 9 WISCONSIN

(7) 8 KENTUCKY

(8) 8 LOUISIANA

(4) 8 WEST VIRGINIA

(3) 7 CONNECTICUT

(5) 7 IOWA

(5) 7 WYOMING

(5) 6 NEVADA

(4) 6 NEW MEXICO

(5) 6 OKLAHOMA

(3) 5 NEW HAMPSHIRE

(4) 4 ALASKA

(3) 4 DELAWARE

(4) 4 INDIANA

(1) 4 NEBRASKA

(3) 3 ALABAMA

(3) 3 IDAHO

(1) 3 MISSISSIPPI

(0) 2 MAINE

(1) 2 NORTH DAKOTA

(2) 2 RHODE ISLAND

(1) 2 SOUTH DAKOTA

(1) 1 DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

(0) 1 VERMONT

852