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It is a scenario playing out nationwide. From Oregon to Pennsylvania, hundreds of communities have in recent years either stopped adding fluoride to their water supplies or voted to prevent its addition. Supporters of such bans argue that people should be given the freedom of choice. The broad availability of over-the-counter dental products containing the mineral makes it no longer necessary to add to public water supplies, they say. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that while store-bought products reduce tooth decay, the greatest protection comes when they are used in combination with water fluoridation.
The outcome of an ongoing federal case in California could force the Environmental Protection Agency to create a rule regulating or banning the use of fluoride in drinking water nationwide. In the meantime, the trend is raising alarm bells for public health researchers who worry that, much like vaccines, fluoride may have become a victim of its own success.
The CDC maintains that community water fluoridation is not only safe and effective but also yields significant cost savings in dental treatment. Public health officials say removing fluoride could be particularly harmful to low-income families — for whom drinking water may be the only source of preventive dental care.
“If you have to go out and get care on your own, it’s a whole different ballgame,” said Myron Allukian Jr., a dentist and past president of the American Public Health Association. Millions of people have lived with fluoridated water for years, “and we’ve had no major health problems,” he said. “It’s much easier to prevent a disease than to treat it.”
According to the anti-fluoride group Fluoride Action Network, since 2010, over 240 communities around the world have removed fluoride from their drinking water or decided not to add it.
So lead, plastic, and PFAS are fine but fluoride is where they draw the line…?
They’re also against vaccines because supposedly vaccines will damage their DNA… whereas apparently PFAS don’t.
This
The UK used the same argument to stop the addition of iodine to salt. “People already consume enough dietary iodine”. You know what happened? Thyroid diseases are on the rise in the UK again, slowly creeping back to early XX century levels.
I think iodine is underappreciated. But also I think fewer and fewer people use the salt shaker because they eat so much processed food (which has salt that is not iodized). Then you’re down to milk and seafood. Milk gets it because they use iodine to sanitize the udders. So if you don’t drink milk and who eats seafood on most days. Solution to anyone reading: multivitamin.
You can’t trust this stuff. I only drink water straight from the creek and- excuse me, my diarrhea is acting up.
We need to stop letting the village idiots make policy.
We need to stop letting the conservatives make policy.
FTFY
That would require a large community effort to resist occupation.
Yes we definitely need to get rid of this democracy thing /s
If you want to protect democracy maybe don’t defend the worst examples of it.
The christofascists are trying to destroy democracy. The village idiots are their brown shirts.
It’s only “fluoride” if it’s from the Florida region of the United States of America—otherwise it’s just a sparkling inorganic, monatomic anion of fluorine.
This is what happens when you have an scientifically illiterate population.
It’s the old Alex Jones “turning the frogs gay” line. Just enough science to hurt yourself with.
On a more positive note if they lose their teeth they might have less luck at reproduction. Problem fixes itself, fingers crossed
This sounds like that Simpsons episode where the school board votes down the “free recharging of fire extinguishers”. They aren’t even saying that their might be problems with floride, they just want choice for the option of choices sake. What is next, freedom to push your children into traffic?
they just want choice for the option of choices sake.
This is a common talking point for people who can’t otherwise justify their position. It’s the “because I said so” of arguing. You see it a lot with far right talking points, where they’ll frame it as freedom of choice, when it’s really just an excuse to pander to conspiracy theorists, the extremely religious, racists, homophobes, etc…
“The civil war wasn’t about slavery; it was about states’ rights.”
“If I want to refuse service to a gay couple, that should be my choice.”
“If I want to refuse service to a mixed race couple, that should be my choice.”
For some reason, they never came around on the Pro-Choice movement, though
But, but, but… states rights.
When the tap water is “cloudy, bubbly, and milky” I think of a thousand different reasons why this could be. Flourid is not on that list.
If the tap water looks like that, I’d have the installarion checked before anything else. And I would not put it beyond an American water provider to deliver absolutely shitty water.
There are plenty of places that deliver bubbly, cloudy, milky water and it ain’t from fluoride
God i wish my community fluoridated its water. Just had a kid, and anything to help prevent cavities is amazing, and low levels of floride is such an easy, risk free and cheap solution.
Buy fluoridated water for your kid, don’t dose the population with drugs in their water.
None of that conspiracy stuff matters, it doesn’t matter if fluoride is 100% safe. Don’t put drugs in tap water.
but what if the water is naturally too high in fluoride. should we not use “drugs” to remove the flouride to bring it back to safe levels?
Should we remove the “calcium drug” that is in groundwater too? and trace iron? those are drugs the same way fluoride is, should we be removing them?
What about the chlorine we add to water to make sure water remains safe. thats a “drug”, isnt it? should we only ship raw water, and just accept some people will die?
Or should we put on our bigboy pants, and deal with reality?
but what if the water is naturally too high in fluoride. should we not use “drugs” to remove the flouride to bring it back to safe levels?
If a natural body of water that is to be used as a water supply has high levels of a dangerous substance, yes, it should be removed. I’d say this is common sense, you don’t drink dirty water just because it’s “natural”. Also, it’s not necessary to use other drugs to remove fluoride. Either way, I’m saying adding drugs to municipal water supplies is not a good idea, I’m not making any claims about natural bodies of water.
Should we remove the “calcium drug” that is in groundwater too? and trace iron? those are drugs the same way fluoride is, should we be removing them?
Again, I’m saying adding a drug to municipal water supplies is problematic, not making claims about appropriateness of groundwater.
What about the chlorine we add to water to make sure water remains safe. thats a “drug”, isnt it? should we only ship raw water, and just accept some people will die?
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These are very different questions. If you suddenly removed chlorine from tap water around the U.S., massive numbers, perhaps tens of millions of people would likely die within days. If you suddenly removed the fluoride, rates of tooth decay would increase over the following years.
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Chlorine added to water is not a drug meant to affect the the body of the consumer, it’s to prevent spread of water borne disease.
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Ideally, no I don’t want chlorine added either – the need for chlorinated water is another one of the many problems we create for ourselves when we live at a grotesque overpopulation.
Or should we put on our bigboy pants, and deal with reality?
The reality is that we add a known neurotoxin to our tap water and drug our population to reduce tooth decay. Disprove this statement. Is fluoride not a known neurotoxin?
Its just an odd double standard you have, some chemicals are OK to be added, others are not. My thought process is very simple “fluoride is extremely safe, and everyone deserves the opportunity to live without cavities, lets level that playing field, the same as we do by chlorinating our water”
Fluoride is NOT a neurotoxin in the amounts the found in tap water. Everything is toxic in high enough quantities, and if you think we should ban something because in concentrate it is toxic, then we need to ban water too. If you think fluoride is a neurotoxin in the levels mandated by the FDA, please prove that.
Its just an odd double standard you have, some chemicals are OK to be added, others are not.
You misundersand. No chemeicals added to water are OK, but chlorine is tolerable considering it saves millions of lives. Everything has a cost to benefit ratio. Adding chlorine to tap water has a huge benefit, fluoride does not.
Fluoride is NOT a neurotoxin in the amounts the found in tap water
How can you know the dose a person gets from a drug added to tap water? The fact is that dosing by tap water is one of the worst drug distribution methods possible.
Everything is toxic in high enough quantities, and if you think we should ban something because in concentrate it is toxic, then we need to ban water too
This is silly and does not relate to my argument.
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WTF? No, you shouldn’t want it added randomly to the water. I grew up with well water and my teeth are fine, don’t buy into the bullshit.
I grew up with well water as a child and my baby teeth were wrecked. Adult teeth had fluoride and are fine (for the most part)
So there’s an anecdotal experience that counters yours
N=1 case study from a radically biased individual or multiple rigorous studies by people who understand public health. I just don’t know what to believe!
This has the same kind of vibe as the old people who speak fondly about the good old days back when not even kids had to wear seat belts or be in car seats.
“And I survived!”
you grew up on well water, which is often high in fluoride.
You likely benefited from high fluoride, and just didnt realize it.
Meanwhile, I grew up with fluoride added to the water and only had one maybe two minor cavities by the time I was 25, then moved to a place that has such shitty city water everyone heavily filters it, so even if fluoride is added, the filtering removes most of it, and I have had so many dental problems since, not a single one without at least one filling, and several crowns… So there, my anecdote cancels yours.
JFC this again? I thought all these conspiracy wackadoos had moved on to dumber and crazier things.
Just another pest boil of the lack of scientific education in the US. Anti-Vaxx, Anti-Flouride, Anti-Science in general. Do you guys want to go back to the age of pilgrim fathers, or what?
these people? dude they yearn for the “rural settler life” of course they want to go back to the good old, god fearing, sustenance farmers and factory workers
And tooth rot. Like dental care isn’t expensive and overlooked enough.
Let them go back there, I won’t stop them from being killed by preventable diseases, maimed by wild animals, and, most importantly, no phones and no internet.
o0h no, they arn’t happy until EVERYONE has to live according to Pol Pot’s vision (+church)
Seriously though isn’t that what making everything “great again” in this country is referring to?
I mean, most western countries don’t add fluoride to their water supply, as ingesting significant amounts of fluoride is bad for you. America is an outlier there, as far as I’m aware.
There’s usually small amounts occurring naturally in water. However, we shouldn’t be adding in more, as it’s cytotoxic and were not supposed to injest it.
Western countries do add fluoride, but it’s done regionally depending on natural fluoride content of local water (or, specifically, lack of it).
Well, the US probably adds too much, but a certain minimum level is needed. In some countries, flourides are delivered by other means, e.g. salt.
Fun fact: adding flouride to drinking water is illegal in my country and I think it has always been illegal.
We do have it in varying quantities in our drinking water but that’s apparently because of our geography. We also have maximum limits like many other countries do.
People with their own water wells are more likely to have elevated levels of fluoride in their water.
Teeth…the haves vs. the haves not…another Florida experiment.
They should change nothing and say that they got rid of it. It’s not like these people are smart enough to tell the difference.
Oh good. Whats old is new again.
Flouride conspiracies are old hat compared to most of the bullshit thats been bandied about in the past 10 years.
