Comment by ManBeardPc
21 days ago
In Germany having salt with added fluoride is very common. There is salt without it if you don’t want it though.
21 days ago
In Germany having salt with added fluoride is very common. There is salt without it if you don’t want it though.
That is not true. You are probably thinking of iodine. Actually fluoride is prohibited in children's toothpaste in Germany because of its suspected neurotoxicity.
EDIT: I checked. It is possible to buy salt with added fluoride in Germany but it comes with the health note "Zusätzliche fluoridhaltige Präparate sollten nur auf ärztliche Empfehlung eingenommen werden.", which means you should only use it on recommendation by your MD.
> Actually fluoride is prohibited in children's toothpaste in Germany because of its suspected neurotoxicity.
I can't find any information on this, do you have a source? According to Wikipedia fluoride toothpaste is recommended by health officials in Germany for children(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation_by_countr...)
Thanks for pointing that out. I wrote "prohibited" from what I remembered when my child was little and the discrepancy to the info you provided made me research the topic, so here is a summary of what the law (1223/2009 Cosmetic Products Regulation Annex III) has to say:
Tooth paste with more than one per mille of fluoride has either to be marked as unsuitable for children or has to have a note that children have to be supervised using it and a doctor or dentist has to be consulted in case the child swallows more than a pea-sized amount.
So, not quite prohibited, but far from recommended.
You are right, iodine is the more common one. Fluoride is a less common additive.