Comment by woodruffw
1 year ago
Someone is always getting paid for something. That doesn’t mean dentists have a financial interest your municipality’s water supply.
1 year ago
Someone is always getting paid for something. That doesn’t mean dentists have a financial interest your municipality’s water supply.
They don't except for "eye wash" procedures like fluoride trays and polishes. The ADA has a vested interest in fluoridation because of reputation, and chemical suppliers do to a minimal degree.
A long time ago, it was decided US fluoridation "improved public health" with the quick win of moving the needle of tooth decay while failing to consider the long-term, detrimental health effects of systemic fluoride ingestion. The rest of the world doesn't do it because of the evidence against it and widespread availability of modern dental care products containing fluoride.
The trivialization of anti-fluoridation is primarily due to mass media indoctrination, i.e., Dr. Strangelove, and association with conspiracy wingnuts.
A reputational interest is impossible to falsify. But I also disagree: I don’t think the ADA would lose any face over a change in this position to most people (and to the anti-fluoride people, nothing will change).
> The rest of the world doesn't do it because of the evidence against it and widespread availability of modern dental care products containing fluoride.
Much of continental Europe does fluoridation through dietary additions (e.g. salt). Just because it isn’t in the water doesn’t mean it isn’t added. There are some countries that notably don’t fluoridate at all, and many fall into two camps: they either don’t have safe municipal water supplies, or already have naturally high fluoride levels (sometimes higher than the US’s introduced levels).
You’ve flipped the causality, by the way: it’s in Dr. Strangelove because it is a conspiracy wingnut thing to obsess over.
Learning that the ADA's recommendation has led to decades of mass poisoning of the population into intellectual impairment will absolutely damage the reputation of the ADA.
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