Comment by kelnos

I'm also not convinced that a dentist is credibly an expert here. Sure, I would absolutely expect my dentist to understand what benefits fluoridated water might provide to my teeth. I would not, for example, expect my dentist to be an expert in whether or not fluoridated water could cause damage to other parts of my body.

My previous dentist pushed these $80 (not covered by insurance) fluoride treatments on every cleaning visit. There's no research that shows much of anything about their effectiveness (good or bad). Yet they push them anyway, because it (their words) might help and probably won't harm. That doesn't give me a good feeling about their competence to have an expert opinion on this sort of thing.

I would, however, trust the opinion of someone who is doing medical/dental research, and holds a doctorate in a relevant field.