Billy’s father was Catholic and his mother was Jewish. When he was 23, he married a 40-year old woman who fixed his bad teeth, changed his hairstyle, taught him how to act, and talked him into changing his name. Joan Crawford co-starred with him in eight films. She said he was the most masculine man she had ever met in her life. “He had balls.”
His affair with Crawford lasted 30 years. Her rival Bette Davis is reported to have said Crawford slept with everyone in Hollywood but Lassie. As the story goes, Billy had gum disease and rotten teeth. Finally, all his teeth were removed and replaced with dentures, but the halitosis persisted. His breath was so bad that Vivien Leigh dreaded their kissing scenes. Next time you see their on-screen kiss you’ll be watching a testimony to her ability to act while holding her breath.
A Closer Look at Bad Breath, From a Safe Distance
Halitosis is bad breath that won’t go away, no matter how much mouthwash you use
Bad breath is a catch-all for notably unpleasant odors coming from the mouth. Johns Hopkins says it’s a condition where the breath smells beyond a level considered socially acceptable.
How bad is it?
Americans spend more than $1 billion a year on over-the-counter halitosis products. The Fact Base says more than 40 million Americans have bad breath. The Bad Breath Institute says more than 80 Americans suffer from chronic halitosis. One search agent said it’s 60 million. Another said 31 million. How do you reckon they arrived at their numbers?
They took different approaches, each group confident they’re right and everybody else is wrong. Kinda like religion and politics. If I was forced to produce a single number, I’d say somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 million Americans have bad breath.
Bad breath tests
You can buy a Bad Breath Detector made by the same people who brought us the breathalyzer. It includes a bad breath app, of course. Or you can try a Bad Breath Test Kit that measures the bacteria in your mouth. Put a spoon in your mouth and hold it there for a while, like a Tootsie Roll. Then smell the spoon, which is swarming with the bacteria that live in your mouth. While you’re at it, smell your dental floss* for even more of a treat.
For four interest-free payment of $52.25, you can buy an advanced analysis of “16 precision oral health scores including the status of your oral microbiome”
In addition to testing, “We’ll provide you with nutritional recommendations designed to improve pathway activities related to the production of volatile compounds and bring your oral microbiome into balance.” I don’t know about you, but this seems to be overkill, and I’d want to ask a dentist, not someone trying to sell me a $200 (I know, it’s $209) magic solution to all my real and imagined woes.
Glass Doctor Blog surveyed “over 3,000 persons, diving deep into their personal routines to examine America’s personal hygiene tendencies”
According to the Glass Doctor, the average American flosses 5 times a week. Science Direct says a study of 26,624 adults showed one adult in three flosses daily. With only those two data points, I’d be inclined to have more confidence in statistics provided by Science Direct than by the Glass Doctor Blog, but hey, that’s just me.
I also found this study over at Health and Human Services’ Public Access page. Just read the first sentence if you can
“Given that there were differences in characteristics among the three flossing groups, and that those reporting some flossing group were more similar to those reporting daily flossing, compared to those reporting no flossing, a sensitivity analysis was conducted with a model using any reported flossing versus no flossing to assess whether odds ratios were influenced by the inclusion of those reporting some flossing in the original analysis.” That’s the kind of written explanation that makes me quit reading right away.
We humans don’t care much for being embarrassed
This accounts for our habit of responding to questions with answers we think will be socially acceptable. It’s our tendency to answer questions that make us look good. Experts call it social desirability. We do this by overclaiming the good things we do and under-claiming our bad ones. One of the best examples is how we overclaim on exercise (we actually do less) and underclaim on diets (we actually eat more).
Not all of the people who claim to floss daily actually do. But they know it’s supposed to be good for them and so they say they do when they don’t. Why? Because it’s a bother, a chore, it takes too much time, you know.
Flossing is one thing and brushing is another
Dentistry IQ says a recent survey of 2,000 reporting American adults admitted forgetting to brush their teeth, floss, or use mouthwash five times a week or more. The poll was commissioned by Listerine.
UCLA Health says “About 38% self-report brushing after breakfast, 17% after lunch, and 31% after dinner.” That’s only 86%. They never say if the leftover 14% brush at different times or not at all. Another source says 2% of American adults never brush their teeth. That’s more than 5 million people, folks.
YouGov says 30% of Americans brush their teeth once a day
Half brush twice a day and 10% brush three or more times daily. That’s only 90%, meaning about 10% of Americans brush their teeth less often than once a day, which includes (ugh) those who never brush. More than a third of Young Moderns (young adults) admit to not brushing their teeth for three or more days in a row. This must be the boys who douse themselves in Axe, treating the symptom and not the problem.
“The evidence for flossing is hanging by a string”
Oh, those headline-writing scamps. The Associated Press said a meta-analysis of two dozen studies on flossing found the evidence of any benefits is weak and very unreliable. None of those studies was conducted over long periods of time, meaning studies cannot tie flossing to periodontal disease.
In order to run a proper experiment, you’d need half your group to not brush or floss for decades so you have something to compare the effects of brushing and flossing to. Where are you going to get study participants who won’t brush or floss for decades?
Want to floss more? Do it before you brush. Want your toothpaste to work better? Don’t flush it away with mouthwash. Get your fresh burst some other time.
I found a site that claimed to have 115 synonyms for bad breath
It was an overclaim, of course. But I did learn two new ones. Mephitis, which means skunk, a really foul odor. My favorite is fetor oris, Latin for “bad smell from the mouth.” Rodney Dangerfield said, “My friend’s breath is so bad, his dentist will only treat him over the phone.
Supercalifragilistic pseudo-halitosis
Pseudo-halitosis is when someone thinks without good reason that they have bad breath but no one else does. Some people consider it a compulsion, like Howard Hughes’ handwashing, driven by his irrational fear of germs. Halitophobia, on the other hand, is another irrational fear, in this case, fear of bad breath. It’s the anxiety someone feels when believing their breath stinks and there is no cure.
The two conditions sounded very much alike to me, so I spent a few minutes comparing the two psychological conditions and saw their differences as important only to experts
Psychologists treat both dysfunctions, which you apparently can have at the same time. Clinicians say the rise in both of these illness has much to do with an industry relentlessly pounding away at our insecurities to sell us an ocean of products that will make us more attractive and more popular.
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*The floss in dental floss comes from words that more or less mean thin silk thread. Young Moderns, don’t miss #dentalflossbikini on TikTok.
Bonus
William Clark Gable is said to have boy-toyed his way to fame and fortune with a series of wealthy older women who were Hollywood influencers. His “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn” is maybe the most famous line on film. Warner Brothers studio head Darryl F. Zanuck said “His ears are too big and he looks like an ape.”
