The Relative Assimilation of Fluorine from Fluorine-Bearing Minerals and Food (Tea), and from Water and Food

Abstract

Comparisons have been made by controlled feeding experiments on growing rats, involving twenty-two trio groups, of the retention of dietary fluorine from supplements of sodium fluoride, calcium fluoride, green tea and raw rock phosphate, and from sodium fluoride administered in water and in food. In the latter comparison, the consumptions of water and of food were separated in time as much as possible in order to measure the unobscured effect. In the comparison of sodium fluoride and calcium fluoride, the salts were dissolved in water. In all experiments the fluorine was administered at levels sufficiently low (9 to 12 p.p.m.) to be of significance with reference to the fluorine hazard in human nutrition. The data secured support the following conclusions: