Where to get a personal stash of sodium fluoride and read about where Durango’s Solvay is made

If sodium fluoride gets voted out of the City of Durango drinking water this April, the supporters of fluoridation might want a place to get their own for personal use.

A bottle of Loudwolf-brand fine powdered sodium fluoride that people can mix in their water is available for purchase on Amazon for around $15 dollars.

Today when I checked, a prescription was not required for it.

That’s a lot cheaper than a $110 to $2,000-dollar reverse osmosis filter that’ll be needed by a drinker of city water who doesn’t want to drink sodium fluoridated water that’s coming out of their tap.

People that want to buy some Solvay-brand sodium fluoride that the City of Durango uses, however, might find it much harder to buy than the consumer-grade stuff on Amazon.

That’s because the City’s supplier, Univar, says on their website that they don’t sell to consumers for personal use.

“Univar only sells to properly licensed companies that can purchase and or apply specialty chemical products,” reads the Univar website. “We do not sell to consumers.”

Even if one did know how much sodium fluoride powder to put in a glass of water, they would still want to know if it’s toxic. It says “TOX” on the side of the Loudwolf-brand sodium fluoride bottle that you can get on Amazon. I’ll let you guess what that means:)

Durango’s Solvay-brand sodium fluoride is also toxic, according to a large warning with a skull and cross bones on the front of their bags. On paper, a technical data sheet for the Solvay product says that their sodium fluoride is poisonous when taken internally.

With either sodium fluoride product, one would have the opportunity to mix it with water and consume it as a toxic poison, or as a preventative medical treatment for dental cavities.

City officials on 2nd Avenue, however, as well as numerous health and dental professionals locally say that sodium fluoride can help prevent cavities.

Consumers will have to trust that City officials have balanced the risk of poisoning its community with the possible benefit of preventing their cavities.

On the flip side, Durango has at least a few dentists that disagree with the City fluoridating our water. Dentists like John Rothchild D.D.S., P.C., and Dale Strietzel D.D.S. of Sunrise Dentistry are against the city putting sodium fluoride in our water.

Many people like Dan Sparkman, a local environmental engineer, also struggle with understanding how the the City can make a medical decision for preventing cavities without first obtaining consent from those that drink the medicated water.

The debate about whether sodium fluoride is a drug will continue.

Chinese origins

The origin of Durango’s Solvay sodium fluoride is somewhat murky and mysterious.

It’s origins are not exactly known in terms of how it’s made or a physical address where one could see the production plant from afar.

I obtained a document from the City that describes a general area where Durango’s Solvay brand sodium fluoride is made: in Zhuzhou City China. You can read that Certificate of Origin/Certificate of Analysis about the sodium fluoride that’s produced by Shanghai Mintchem and resold by Solvay Fluorides, LLC, by clicking HERE.

The back of the bags of sodium fluoride at the City’s water treatment plant also says that they are “Made in China.”

Aside from its Chinese origin is the fact that our sodium fluoride has lead in it, however so minuscule it may be, which is still poisonous to humans. Read the most recent independent analysis that the City of Durango had done on some sodium fluoride in this Certificate of Analysis.

Utilities Commission emails

For Durango, fluoridation is a contentious issue that was discussed and voted on by the Utilitites Commission back in May of 2016. Click here to read a letter that was sent from the Utility Commissions to the City Council where most of the voting members recommended against fluoridating our water.

Register to vote

Voters living in city limits may be eligible to vote on the fluoridation of city water in April’s election. To register online with the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office, CLICK HERE.

This is the back of a Solvay brand sodium fluoride bag at the City of Durango’s Water Treatment plant in January, 2017.

These bags of Solvay brand sodium fluoride sit on a pallet at the City of Durango’s Water Treatment Plant in January, 2017.