When the Fort Myers City Council voted unanimously to keep cavity-fighting Fluoride in its drinking water back in February, Councilwoman Diana Giraldo said just because everyone else is jumping off a cliff it doesn’t mean the city has to.
The State Legislature is pushing the city and its 30,000 water customers off that cliff.
Governor Ron DeSantis signed the bill outlawing Fluoride in drinking water on May 15. The legislation follows the advice of Dr. Joseph Ladapo, DeSantis’ controversial hand-picked Surgeon General who has called the practice “public health malpractice”.
Groups like the American Dental Association and the American Society of Pediatrics have hailed Fluoride as virtually a public health miracle. In 1999 the Center for Disease Control and Prevention called fluoridation “one of the 10 great public health achievements” of the Twentieth Century.
The Legislature approved the Fluoride ban in a mostly party line vote. DeSantis has called the practice “forced medication”. Another controversial public health official, Trump-appointed Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., claims the naturally-occurring mineral causes autism.
Not according to dentists and doctors. The ADA reiterated its position in support of Fluoride use in May.
“Community water fluoridation is an extremely effective and inexpensive means of obtaining the fluoride necessary for optimal prevention of tooth decay,” said the Journal of the American Dental Association. “Water fluoridation has been proven to reduce decay in both children and adults.”
But not in Florida. Not any more anyway.
The new Farm Bill removes Fluoride from the list of approved drinking water additives. Dental and health care experts say ending fluoridation of the public water supply could lead to an increase in dental problems, such as cavities. That could affect poorer, often rural populations without dental insurance or which are otherwise limited in their access to dental care.
Dr. William Truax is a Fort Myers dentist and president of Dentists Care, an organization that provides discount dental services to those in need. He spoke to council members when they voted to keep Fluoride back in February, telling them removing the mineral would hurt the people he sees – those who cannot afford regular, routine dental care.
“Council got it right,” Truax said this week of the February vote. “They really did.”
Truax described DeSantis and Ladapo as “non-science”.
“DeSantis doesn’t care,” he said. “The governor has mandated July 1, and I think they’re going to have to go along with the Governor.”
The twin council votes on city police working with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement showed what can happen when a local government fails to go along with Tallahassee-imposed policies.
The council deadlocked 3-3 on March 17, refusing to approve an “agreement” with ICE to train and utilize city police in its enforcement. Threats from DeSantis to remove council members and from Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier to investigate them – plus threats from others against the council members safety – sparked a second vote at an emergency meeting on May 21.
The city council fell in line and approved the agreement unanimously.
“I think they’re going to have to go along,” Truax said.
Water from Fort Myers Utilities is naturally Fluoridated, as is much of the nation’s water. The concentration is only .28 percent, however, far les than the .7 percent that health experts recommend.
Dental experts say the opposition to Fluoride is rooted in a single discredited study from China, a study that focused on affects on people who live in a region where naturally-occurring Fluoride is many times the .7 percent rate that experts recommend.
At about the same time Fort Myers was voting to keep Fluoride other local governments, the Lee County Commission, Naples City Council and Collier County Commission among them, voted virtually without comment to remove Fluoride.
The Fort Myers City Council will meet at 4:30 p.m. Monday, June 2. Council meetings take place at City Hall at 2200 Second Street downtown.
This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: State over-rules city vote – Fort Myers Council voted to keep Fluoride – state says no way
Reporting by Charlie Whitehead, Fort Myers News-Press / Fort Myers News-Press
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
