Silicofluorides (SilicoFs) added to drinking water may even promote cocaine use and violent crime. SilicoFs are waste products from phosphate fertiliser and glass manufacturing. In Florida, they are banned from ocean-dumping, but approved for adding to drinking water. Nevertheless, they do end up in the oceans. When fertiliser-plant waste was introduced into fluoridation of drinking water, the US Environmental Protection Agency and the Public Health Service waived all testing procedures (Glasser GC, Fluoride and the phosphate connection, Earth Island J Spec Rep, 1998; 14-5).

SilicoFs are made by converting sulphuric acid into hydrofluoric acid, which is then run through aqueous sand to make fluorosilicic acid.

SilicoFs increase the absorption of lead when a person is exposed. The lead blocks the action of calcium in fostering the production of brain neurotransmitters. Among these, dopamine and serotonin appear to suppress violent, aggressive and autistic behaviour. Cocaine addiction appears to be tied to low levels of dopamine in the brain; lead in the brain depresses dopamine levels as well as intelligence (Acad Today, 1998; Sept 8).

The drinking water in Littleton, Colorado, has been polluted with this type of fluoride since May 1954. They have also been poured for decades into the drinking water in Paducah, Kentucky, and Fayetteville, Tennessee - all scenes of recent, extreme school violence and deaths.

The finding connecting silicoFs to violence came from statistical analyses of 25 communities in Massachusetts and 129 mostly rural communities in Georgia. The people living there showed higher blood levels of lead than people elsewhere, and a correspondingly higher level of violence.