Utah Becomes First State to Remove Fluoride from Public Water Systems
On Thursday Utah became the first state to ban the use of fluoride in its public water systems after a bill was signed into law by Governor Spencer Cox. The law will go into effect on May 7.
The law specifically states that no individual or “political subdivision” may add fluoride to a public water system or “enforce an ordinance that requires or permits the addition of fluoride to water in, or water that will be introduced into, a public water.”
According to NBC News, prior to the law’s passing, Utah had the lowest percentage of fluoridated water consumption among the US with 44% of the population drinking it.
US Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has spoken against fluoride and has said he would advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water.”
However, Governor Cox stated the results of fluoridated water in his state have proven ineffective. He even implied that, through fluoride in water, the government is medicating its population unbeknownst to them:
“You would think you would see drastically different outcomes with half the state not getting it and half the state getting it. I’ve talked to a lot of dentists. We haven’t seen that. So it’s got to be a really high bar for me if we’re going to require people to be medicated by their government.”
The defluoridation of American water has spread to other states. NBC News reports that Kentucky, Montana, and Tennessee have each “filed bills to make fluoridation optional for water systems or prevent the mineral from being added to systems altogether.” Florida, Ohio, and South Carolina are each proposing, or considering to propose, similar legislation.
The American Dental Association (ADA), along with the Center for Disease Control (CDC), claim that fluoride strengthens teeth and prevents tooth cavities. The ADA said the law shows “wanton disregard for the oral health and well-being of their constituents.”
ADA President Brett Kessler expressed his concern with the law and said it is based on “pseudoscience”:
“As a father and a dentist, it is disheartening to see that a proven, public health policy, which exists for the greater good of an entire community’s oral health, has been dismantled based on distorted pseudoscience,” he said.
In an episode of Culture Apothecary, Jennifer Simmons, MD said that fluoride is a “horrendous endocrine disruptor” and causes severe thyroid issues by replacing iodine within the thyroid hormone.
In another Culture Apothecary episode, Dr. Kelly Blodgett, a holistic dentist, discussed a variety of defects derived from fluoride in dentistry and drinking water. One concerning note he made is how exposure to fluoride can decrease the brain function of children, shown through studies measuring children IQ.
He also discussed another issue with fluoridated water which, ironically, is a dental issue:
“So people who have… lived in Colorado in an area where it was naturally very highly occurring in fluoride in the water. We would see… fluorosis, big white, sometimes even brown patches on teeth just due to too much fluoride when your teeth were developing.”
Dr. Blodgett also made an excellent point regarding the non-use of fluoride throughout human history, which, he says, was not as problematic as some may think it was prior to the arrival of fluoride in dentistry and water:
“[H]ow many millennia did human beings live on the planet without fluoridated water or, you know, fluoride in your toothpaste and managed, again, you go back to Weston Price’s work, that stuff wasn’t in the system, and people still had healthy teeth, wide arches, big airways, and didn’t have decay.”
