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Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

bbc.com

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Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#471

Post by Tade0 »

jdminhbg wrote: post #234
freehorse wrote: post #123

This is one of these US-specific polarised debates I find really bizarre, around some kind of issue that the rest of the world has by large solved but without any acknowledgement of this fact. Maybe the US should look into how other countries have solved it? It is completely bizarre witnessing both sides getting so polarised around a basically non-issue.

What I love about this comment is that one person thought "of course every other country just does the right thing when the US doesn't" and posted it, and then a bunch of other people thought "of course every other country just does the right thing when the US doesn't" and upvoted it, and not a single one of them thought to check what the "right thing" is. Meanwhile, back here on Earth-1, there's no right thing, and…

Germany and France don't fluoridate water, but they add fluorine compounds to table salt.

Meanwhile growing up in Poland in the 90s as kids we had these fluoridation sessions in school, for which everyone had to bring their toothbrush and brush their teeth with some kind of sour tasting fluid that contained fluorine.

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#473

Post by kelnos »

lukan wrote: post #386
AndrewSwift wrote: post #368

People who want to remove fluoride from the water should visit countries where fluoride is not added and look at people's teeth. I live in France and it's just so obvious that people grew up without fluoride — even celebrities try to talk without showing their teeth when they're on TV! I'm all for getting consent in most cases, but sometimes you'd have to be an idiot not to take the obvious win. It's like we were del…

But flakes of gold are not associated with a lower IQ in children. "The NTP monograph concluded, with moderate confidence, that higher levels of fluoride exposure, such as drinking water containing more than 1.5 milligrams of fluoride per liter, are associated with lower IQ in children." https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/whatwestudy/assessments/noncancer/... So it is also not clear, if the lower concentration typically found…

So in other words, 0.7mg/L fluoridated water is also not associated with lower IQ in children. That study did not prove it safe, but it did prove it unsafe, either.

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#475

Post by barotalomey »

Tade0 wrote: post #471
jdminhbg wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I love about this comment is that one person thought "of course every other country just does the right thing when the US doesn't" and posted it, and then a bunch of other people thought "of course every other country just does the right thing when the US doesn't" and upvoted it, and not a single one of them thought to check what the "right thing" is. Meanwhile, back here on Earth-1, there's no right thing, and…

Germany and France don't fluoridate water, but they add fluorine compounds to table salt. Meanwhile growing up in Poland in the 90s as kids we had these fluoridation sessions in school, for which everyone had to bring their toothbrush and brush their teeth with some kind of sour tasting fluid that contained fluorine.

> we had these fluoridation sessions in school

We had the same in Sweden up until the early 90s, and it's apparently doing sort of a revival in some schools.

https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluortant

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#476

Post by karparov »

hayst4ck wrote: post #347

Putting fluoride in water promotes freedom. That sounds crazy, but let me justify it. If you are poor you can't go anywhere or buy anything. You're not free if you're poor. If you are sick, you may be confined to a hospital bed or not feel good enough to do anything. If you are sick you're not free. Putting fluoride in water reduces dental costs and incidence of cavities and therefore tooth infections, particularly a…

It's also restricting the freedom of communities if you ban them from adding fluoride to their water if they like to.

This ban is anti-freedom. (Just like forcing them could be argued to be, even though that's what you argued against.)

So, this ban is arguably reducing freedoms on multiple levels.

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#477

Post by briandear »

These American experts who are “disheartened” — do they not pay attention to Europe? Or do they only get upset when Republicans do something?

Europe (and many parts of Asia,) is objectively healthier than most of the residents of the USA; so maybe rather than knee-jerking against anything RFK Jr., perhaps the so-called experts should start doing their jobs and looking at what healthier places in the rest of the world are doing. The status quo in the USA is default fat and unhealthy. Why aren’t the fluoride cheerleaders not using their “expert” status to shout against high fructose corn syrup, artificial coloring, or the fact that most American food tastes like sugar?

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#478

Post by karparov »

refurb wrote: post #433
jvm___ wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Freedom from is the American way. Freedom to is the Canadian way. That's why Canada becoming an American anything is ridiculous and pisses off Canada so much that, for example, we've reduced our flights to America by +70% over the coming months.

Canada does the opposite of America even if it hurts Canada - it’s a part of its identity. Redefining freedom as “forcing something on people for their own good” is not how anyone actually defines freedom. It’s like saying children have the most freedom because their parents force them to do things that will benefit them.

As a European who has lived in both countries I can only laugh at this. From our perspective, US and Canada are 99% identical, culturally.

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#479

Post by ekianjo »

estebank wrote: post #390
artvandelai wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adding fluoride to water was revolutionary in the 1940s, but its benefits have significantly declined since fluoride toothpaste became common in the 1970s. While fluoridation made sense when products containing fluoride weren't widely available, it is much less effective and necessary now. Sure, some countries and communities may still see benefits from it, but widespread fluoridation doesn't seem necessary in many p…

There's a huge difference between "no longer as necessary" and "let's ban it".

You can add fluoride in your own water if you want to. Nobody is preventing your own freedom to drink fluoride.

Re: Utah becomes first US state to ban fluoride in its water

#480

Post by kelnos »

Speedy218 wrote: post #74
jiggawatts wrote: post #44

I 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…

> but now it is “overmedicating” a vulnerable fraction of the population. Makes sense, but the intention also is that many people do not brush their teeth, or at least do not brush them as often as they should, and so fluoride is added to drinking water to compensate so people's teeth don't start to fall out at an alarming rate.

I'm pretty sure that no amount of fluoridated water is going to save you if you do not brush your teeth.

Even if the fluoride somehow manages to overcome all that and prevent you from getting cavities, the gum disease will eventually cause all your teeth to fall out.

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