A battle is brewing across towns in America over whether or not to continue using fluoride in the water.
It’s a process known as fluoridation, which began around 1945. According to the American Cancer Society, it became popular nationwide after scientists noted that people living in higher water fluoride levels had fewer cavities.
By 1962, the United States Public Health Service (PHS) recommended fluoride in public drinking water supplies to mitigate tooth decay. The American Cancer Society estimates that fluoride is now used in the public drinking water supplied to roughly three out of four Americans.
However, opponents have been sounding the alarm over the years that fluoride in drinking water is unsafe for consumption. One organization leading the charge is the Fluoride Action Network (FAN). The organization, on a mission to broaden awareness of what it says, is the “toxicity of fluoride compounds,” says most developed countries worldwide are not using fluoride in their drinking water on the same level as America or, in fact, at all.
The organization says it has helped more than 500 communities successfully reject fluoridation, and there could be more.
Federal Leaders Getting Louder About Halting Fluoride Usage
While FAN says communities have rejected fluoridation for the last few decades, and as a result, the process has declined, this battle has taken center stage over the last few months.
For starters, the National Toxicology Program, a federal agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, reported with “moderate confidence” that there is a link between communities with higher levels of fluoride exposure and lower IQs in children. These communities are using more than twice the recommended limit, according to the Associated Press.
A month later, a federal judge reportedly ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate fluoride in drinking water further because higher levels could impact children.
President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy, said he would end fluoridation.
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