DENTAL DECAY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 19 November 1940, Page 6

DENTAL DECAY

INCIDENCE AMONG ESKIMOS ATTRIBUTED TO REFINED SUGAR. RESULTS OF FIELD SURVEY IN AMERICA. “An unsweetened tooth cannot decay,” states the Journal of the American Dental Association in commenting on an interview with Mr L. M. Waugh, D.D.S., F.A.C.D., New York. Part of the interview reads as follow: —

“The primitive Eskimo eating his native food does not have tooth decay. When he eats ‘civilised’ or ‘store’ food, his teeth begin to decay just as rapidly as ours, the children being especially affected. This proves that tooth health depends on the food they eat. The foods traded to them by the white man when their teeth first began to decay were refined wheat flour, molasses, sugar and tea. Tea alone, it has been proved, cannot cause decay. Therefore, the cause must be found in the other three; namely, refined wheat flour, sugar and molasses. The missionaries told us that wheat flour, both in bulk and as hard tack or sea biscuit, had been traded to the natives before 1884, and that up to 1902, there had been no tooth complaints. It was when prospectors and traders supplied the natives with molasses and sugar that their teeth began to decay. The disease spread so fast that in two years, the missionaries had to send for forceps for the extraction of the natives' teeth.

“The primitive Eskimo subsisting on his native diet of proteins, not any of which is fermentable, has the best teeth, with the least dental caries, of all known races. When he begins to eat ‘civilised’ foods, there soon is a marked deterioration of the teeth and jaws. He is very fond of sweets. This results in rapid tooth decay, almost more rapid than in white children. Eskimo teeth are often worn almost to the gum as the result of chewing tough, uncooked and gritty native foods and rawhide in making boots, clothing and harness. The older generations, reared on native foods, invariably have vastly better teeth and stronger, larger jaws, than do their grandchildren who are getting ‘civilised’ or store’ foods, which are softer. “We were able to study native children in two primitive and one semimodern Eskimo settlement,” Mr Waugh stated. “We found that conditions ranging from lack of sunshine and home comforts, with no milk, almost no fruits and vegetables and no grains of any kind, would, if anything, tend to make them more susceptible to tooth decay. Their good dental health is, certainly not due to a superiority of native foods. We went to Alaska again and selected a good number of primitives of all ages, fully removed from civilisation, for the purpose of tabulating the effect of natural sugars and of refined sugars, syrup and candies, upon natives free of tooth decay. The ages ranged from 12 years to old age. The subjects were able to get only their native food plus what we gave them. Their mouths wore free from decay and their saliva had no germs of tooth decay. They came in once daily, and each group was carefully fed in the laboratory a definite quantity of refined sugar. Every native received the same amount of the same sweet each day and ate all of it. In two weeks, 88 per cent showed the presence of the specific bacteria of dental caries (Lactobacillus acidophilus) and. at the end of five and one-half weeks, every mouth showed tooth decay, with an average of 3.6 cavities per mouth. Understand, that these cavities were formed in less than six weeks in mouths of Eskimos who had never before had a decayed tooth. The only difference in their food was the addition of refined sugar. “In the parallel experiment in which natural sugar as formed in dried raisins, figs, dates and prunes was added to the diet, not one person developed any tooth decay. Therefore, natural sugar should be substituted for refined sweets as nearly as possible.”