Cape Town Smile Studios

The Politics Surrounding Amalgam Fillings

Controversy and Confusion

In medicine, if a drug has one chance in 1,000 of causing an adverse reaction, the patient is informed.  In dentistry, a dentist may place any number of EPA-listed toxic substances in your mouth without giving you the slightest hint of the potential side-effects.  Mercury, copper, nickel, beryllium, zinc, phenol, formaldehyde and acetone are just a few of the nearly 100 chemicals that are placed daily into unsuspecting patients’ mouths. The ADA is fighting tooth and nail to prevent ‘informed consent’ in dentistry. Their reasoning is that this would imply that these materials are harmful.

The automobile industry went through a similar trauma some years ago when it balked against the mandatory installation of seatbelts.  By installing seatbelts the implication was that you could get hurt in a car.  The admission of this obvious fact led to the saving of thousands of lives every year due to the presence of seatbelts.

The most common questions I get asked are: “If amalgam fillings are so toxic, why did the dental profession decide to use them in the first place and why do they continue to use them?”

Every time, no matter whom the audience is (expert or lay), this question arises and the answer is pretty straightforward. According to the ADA, the primary reasons were that amalgam fillings were easy to use and inexpensive. It was thus seen as a filling for the masses and the operator needed minimal training to use it. Certainly ignorance also played a role, because the technology necessary to prove that mercury vapour is released from amalgams didn’t exist at that time.

Hence the mantra:

“The set amalgam product is a stable, inert filling material ... and does not release any mercury”.

But the course of events has clearly shown that the profit motive ultimately led to the creation of the ADA and, from it, the continued use of these fillings today.

In the left hand corner of the boxing ring is the ADA and its pro-amalgam supporters that maintain mercury fillings are completely safe and harmless. In the right hand corner is the WHO that states that there is no safe level of mercury exposure. The vast majority of the world’s scientific community, thousands of mercury-safe dentists and every government regulatory agency (consisting of non-pro-amalgam dental scientists) recognise that mercury is a powerful poison and must be closely monitored and strictly regulated. When I talk to scientists who work in laboratories, it always amuses me to see the utter disbelieve on their faces when I tell them that the ‘silver’ fillings in their teeth are actually 50% mercury! In the laboratory they are compelled to adhere to the strictest safety measures when working with mercury and regular visits by state and governmental agencies are feared should they not be satisfied with the safety standards.

The real issue isn’t whether amalgams are structurally sound, easy to use, or inexpensive.  It’s whether amalgam fillings are hazardous to your health. But how can they be if 80% of the vapour released by amalgam is inhaled and distributed throughout the body?

More than 150 million people in the U.S. have amalgam fillings and the WHO states that the average person with these fillings could receive more mercury from them than from food (particularly seafood), air and water combined.

How can it be possible that mercury released from amalgam fillings is considered safe by the ADA, but toxic when released from all other sources?

Fortunately it seems as if the public, on the one hand and concerned dentists on the other hand, do not believe the story told by the ADA and pro-amalgam factions anymore. For the first time since the use of amalgam started, there are more dentists in the United States (52%) that are no longer using amalgam fillings than there are those that still use them. Some of the dentists surveyed in 2007 criticised amalgam for its toxicity and tendency to fracture teeth. The public have become wise to the toxin in amalgam and now insist on non-mercury fillings.

This is a significant landmark in the battle to ban these fillings. One of the ADA’s most consistent arguments in support of amalgam fillings is that amalgam is a very good filling material.

But now dentists believe amalgam is not only toxic, but it also is not a good dental filling material. I have removed probably thousands of ‘serviceable’ amalgams, only to discover rotten tooth structure or fractures inside the tooth. The instances where the tooth was healthy or there were no fracture lines on the inside of the tooth must be less than 10%.  If medical insurance will only be willing to pay for replacement of amalgam fillings, before there are fractures and infections, they would save millions. (In South Africa medical insurance companies do not pay for the removal of amalgam fillings where it is due to concern of mercury toxicity.)

Many rank and file members of the ADA are starting to believe it too and are jumping off the doomed ship called ‘Amalgam’.

Another issue is that developments in this area evolve rapidly, with the result that, by the time experience has been registered for one material, new materials and reportedly improved versions are already available.