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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

#571

Post by regularjack »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #562
karparov wrote: post #476

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In the political philosophy of the US, the unit whose freedoms matter is the individual, not the community. Freedoms for individuals necessarily come from reducing the freedom of "the community."

AKA as the spoiled brat kind of freedom.

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

#572

Post by bell-cot »

ryao wrote: post #168

Fluoride in Toothpaste: Do not ingest. Flouride in Water: Ingest away. I do not understand how these two can co-exist.

Fluorine is a dietary mineral.

At higher dosages, every dietary mineral becomes harmful, then (generally) lethal.

Without iron, humans die. Yet accidental (over-)ingestion of iron supplements is a leading cause of poisoning in small children.

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

#573

Post by cyanydeez »

impossiblefork wrote: post #568
PartiallyTyped wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Here in Sweden we decided against fluoride for this reason and the fact that it is in fact toxic. How? Please don't express that it damages development. That's trivially refutable by statistics. We can compare Canada's and UK's IQs for example, or some other proxy to the G factor, said countries were chosen for their similar cultural demographics, we find then that the metrics are mostly identical, while the differ…

https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/EHP14534 is one study. We did earlier studies in the 50s when we made the decision to only use fluoride orally.

doesn't discuss any confounding variables that may also correlate with the use/disuse of flouride.

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

#574

Post by cyanydeez »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #559
Perenti wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not true. Every time I see a dentist here in Queensland (non-fluoridated water) he asks me where else I lived as my teeth are so much better than what he usually sees, and if drilling my teeth are much harder than most Queenslanders. My early years were spent in Melbourne, where fluoridation was introduced around 1970. That's the only time I lived with fluoridated water, for about 3 years. yet dentists can see the ef…

> I don't use a toothbrush or toothpaste, and haven't ever really, as my ASD makes it unbearable. 99% of the world does brush their teeth, so I don't see how this is relevant to their health.

No, no they do not. Where do you make up these statistics?

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

#575

Post by pclmulqdq »

espadrine wrote: post #453
ekianjo wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Putting fluoride in water promotes freedom. I rather define freedom by the government not deciding what's good for me

> I rather define freedom by the government not deciding what's good for me Does that mean you are against this bill? Before the bill, your community could either use your own water system, without fluoride, or use the wider system, which has fluoride. After this bill, your community no longer can use your own water system with fluoride, and the wider system also does not have fluoride. On a first read, this bill mak…

"Your community could decide" is not freedom in the American political sense. In US political theory, the unit of freedom is the individual, full stop.

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

#576

Post by ViscountPenguin »

Perenti wrote: post #502
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…

Not true. Every time I see a dentist here in Queensland (non-fluoridated water) he asks me where else I lived as my teeth are so much better than what he usually sees, and if drilling my teeth are much harder than most Queenslanders. My early years were spent in Melbourne, where fluoridation was introduced around 1970. That's the only time I lived with fluoridated water, for about 3 years. yet dentists can see the ef…

Are you in FNQ? Around Brissie and the Goldie we're all flouridated.

I've heard similar rumours about army recruitment in the 80s though.

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

#577

Post by zouhair »

impossiblefork wrote: post #529
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…

But you will brush your teeth anyway, and then you apply fluoride topically. It works. Here in Sweden we decided against fluoride for this reason and the fact that it is in fact toxic. It isn't sensible to use systemic exposure when we can use topical exposure and can improve mouth health by education, so that people do what they're supposed to. The fluoride approach achieves a basic level of health, but you can do s…

Just an FYI, water is also toxic.

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

#578

Post by saberience »

adrian_b wrote: post #389
quitit wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The missing context here is that the science and established benefits of fluoride aren’t a culture war political football in those countries. These countries largely publicly recognise the benefits of fluoride, but don’t add it because: - Some countries opt for intake via supplementation. - Some have a naturally sufficient supply in drinking water via natural processes. - Some even need to reduce the abundance of flu…

[flagged]

Just a note for future people reading this comment. This is completely and totally wrong, and arguably should be deleted from Hackernews for being so deluded.

There have been countless studies that show that communities with flouride in the water have consistently lower rates of tooth decay than communities without fluoride in the water. In fact, community water fluoridation has been recognized as one of the great public health achievements of the 20th century.

Systematic reviews and meta-analyses have shown repeatedly that water fluoridation reduces tooth decay in both children and adults by approximately 25-30%.

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

#579

Post by zouhair »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #559
Perenti wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not true. Every time I see a dentist here in Queensland (non-fluoridated water) he asks me where else I lived as my teeth are so much better than what he usually sees, and if drilling my teeth are much harder than most Queenslanders. My early years were spent in Melbourne, where fluoridation was introduced around 1970. That's the only time I lived with fluoridated water, for about 3 years. yet dentists can see the ef…

> I don't use a toothbrush or toothpaste, and haven't ever really, as my ASD makes it unbearable. 99% of the world does brush their teeth, so I don't see how this is relevant to their health.

25% of the world population do not have access to drinkable water[0], brushing their teeth is a luxury for them.

[0]: https://toronto.citynews.ca/2023/03/22/un-26-of-world-lacks-...

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

#580

Post by bell-cot »

knowknow wrote: post #351

I feel like we are so privileged in the US that there’s little to no personal consequences for being so wrong about a topic. Eventually there’s needs to be a correction, whether it’s because we regain our senses or we stray so far that the majority of people start to be majorly affected. I’m fearing it’s the latter.

That's because drinking non-fluoridated water is very cheap (a minimal disadvantage). Vs. opposing fluoridated water can be very valuable (give the current culture wars).

Notice that nobody is arguing about keeping water-born pathogens out of the drinking water.

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