Earlier quoted context omitted.
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What do you mean? There's literally tons of evidence. Do you think fluoride doesn't actually reduce cavities?
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Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
131–140 of 1001 posts
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you prove no effect on any bodily system long term? People don’t like to talk about it, or they pretend otherwise, but this is basically impossible. If the benefit is great enough then the risk makes sense. That is the case in a lot of areas. Is it worth taking a risk of an unknown effect somewhere in the body in exchange for… a marked but not even drastic reduction in cavities…? Not sure…
Fluoride stays in your body, should be some way to measure it?
Fluoride rapidly forms a highly insoluble calcium fluoride salt. So you won't find a lot of it in blood or other easily accessible body fluids.
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why does it matter how the list was compiled? Is the information accurate or not? The first link you referenced with the cherry picked sentence about uncertainty for levels below .7mg/l was a meta analysis of 74 different studies, 64 of which showed a negative correlation between child IQ and fluoridation. This isn’t even taking into account evidence of a positive correlation for early onset puberty, sleep disruption…
It matters because your statement of "Here’s a list of the most convincing studies or meta analyses." assumes some kind of curating. If all you're doing is providing something akin to a google search, it's not really valuable.
> It matters because your statement of "Here’s a list of the most convincing studies or meta analyses." assumes some kind of curating.
Agreed
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lot of that is due to the Mormons. While they tend to vote Republican, they are some of the biggest socialists out there. They believe in giving 10% of their income to the church (and enforce it!). Then they redistribute to their poorest members in the form of free private education at all pre-college levels and highly subsidized college as well. And with food banks, free or subsidized medical services, and whole b…
That’s the steel-man version of (american) conservatism: civic institutions provide the safety net instead of the government. And in terms of aggregate outcomes, Utah’s results are impressive. The LDS apparently does a better job teaching kids to read than the government here in Maryland.
>civic institutions provide the safety net instead of the government
Now that the internet has destroyed local community and trust in institutions, what will conservatism do?
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#135I initially dismissed it as the same category of stupid as anti-vax beliefs, but it turns out that there are a decent amount of good studies showing a link between fluoride in water and (slightly) lower IQ when pregnant mothers ingest the fluoride. Note that there is no significant effect after birth. The idea is to remove fluoride from water and advise pregnant women to use fluoride-free toothpaste. Everyone else ca…
Agree, my biggest issue is often where they source the fluoride and whether they test it. We found out in my (liberal) hometown that they were actually sourcing some derivative which has no human studies.
Given that everyone gets enough in toothpaste I just don’t see the reason to keep doing it, too much can go wrong. It’s kind of a strange mass medication that I’m not sure the government needs to be involved in.
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#136Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#137I initially dismissed it as the same category of stupid as anti-vax beliefs, but it turns out that there are a decent amount of good studies showing a link between fluoride in water and (slightly) lower IQ when pregnant mothers ingest the fluoride. Note that there is no significant effect after birth. The idea is to remove fluoride from water and advise pregnant women to use fluoride-free toothpaste. Everyone else ca…
The IQ link is very heavily lacking in evidence. In the actual research the main "risk" posed by flouridated water is actually fluorosis. This causes minerals in your enamel to be replaced with flouride which can cause them to be brittle in the long term. It's pretty uncommon but the thought is that now that flouride toothpaste are commonplace, the benefit of flouridated water is also way less. Which changes the calc…
Which changes the calculus
Was that intentional? (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dental_calculus for those who didn't get the reference.)
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#138What is the best evidence in favor of this?
There isn’t any. The very little research showing any effects on cognitive abilities are experiments using very high fluoride levels - nowhere near the levels in water. Like most conservative “stances”, it’s a farce.
I'd like to point out that fluoride was previously very much a liberal stance until the rise in MAGA/Qanon conservatives.
I grew up in the PNW of the USA and lots of small hippie towns have been removing fluoride for decades. It comes up on city ballots every year in Oregon.
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#139I’m disappointed in the news media fails to mention the cascading effects of dental health. Yes, the primary and direct benefit of fluoride is to have a healthier mouth. But having a healthy mouth is far from the end goal, imo. If your mouth is full of cavities you’re more likely to build up bacteria that cause downstream effects as serious as heart disease. Also if your mouth is routinely uncomfortable you may gravi…
So you're saying that dental health is essential for the rest of the body? Yet, Canada doesn't include it in its famous 'universal free healthcare'... I'd actually just like to see more money put into public dental assistance. And education.
> I'd actually just like to see more money put into public dental assistance. And education.
I would want to see that in anti fluoride campaigns and laws as well, but have not see that happen in the laws and campaigns I have followed. Or in the HN comments I have responded to on the subject, most focus on banning and provide no follow, or no structured follow up like - free toothpaste, required educations, and follow up studies, reassess in X years.
Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water
#140What is the best evidence in favor of this?
Actual reseachers don't really talk about links to IQ. The main concern is actually around dental fluorosis. Too much flouride can replace minerals in your teeth causing them to become brittle over time There's a subset of researchers that argue that now that fluoride toothpaste is widespread, the benefit of fluoridating water is much much smaller than it first was and the (small) risk of fluorosis is now comparative…
Where "main concern" means not a practical concern at all. You are adopting the talking points of cranks when what is of actual concern is things like drinking sugar, negligent parents or basic access to dental healthcare or even just dental education.
The CDC tracks some key indicators like mean decayed, missing or filled teeth (DMFT) and in critical age groups like 12-15 there has been no progress made in the past 20 years and the US continue lagging behind European countries: https://www.cdc.gov/oral-health/media/pdfs/Oral-Health-Surve...
And none of that has anything to do with fluoride in the water or not.