There’s an argument to be made that we should be in total control of everything that goes into our bodies and I support that idea to an extent. However when your decision can adversely impact the lives of others that’s when I support intervention which is why I wholly support compulsory vaccination. This also extends to my support of water fluoridation as, again, whilst there’s numerous arguments that can be made against it the fact that it will benefit so many at almost no risk to others means it’s a net positive for us as a whole. Of course this hasn’t stopped a vocal minority from claiming all sorts of horrific things happening due to water fluoridation the worst of which being that it’ll make you stupid.
A single article on Huffington Post usually wouldn’t warrant my attention, it’s not exactly known as the bastion of sound scientific reporting, but it came across my path not long after a similar post from a Facebook page called The Mind Unleashed claiming that fluoride in water lowered IQ significantly. Because I couldn’t help myself I spent a good couple hours tracking down the research and other articles relating to it. Just like most reporting on scientific discoveries this one is completely overblown and, when you dig into the details, doesn’t support the conclusions that many would draw from it.
I’d love to say that I was surprised by this but this isn’t my first rodeo with bullshit.
A review of water fluoridation studies done researchers at Harvard University concluded that whilst water fluoridation may affect IQ scores the levels that were detected in the study were at least 10 times higher than what’s found in artificially fluoridated water. Additionally the studies failed to control for other variables which are known to affect brain development and IQ scores like the fact that many of the studies were conducted in highly polluted areas in China. Funnily enough the control group in one of the studies were consuming water with similar levels of fluoridation to that of developed countries which shows pretty clearly that the current dosage levels work without the noted side effects.
On the flip side there’s a lot of research that shows water fluoridation reduces cavities in children and adults by a significant percentage, even in those who already have access to it through other means (like toothpaste or as an additive in other food staples). Indeed if you’ll allow me to get hand wavy for a bit there’s evidence to suggest that the average IQ has been trending upwards for the last hundred years or so called the Flynn effect. If fluoridation had a significant impact on IQ scores then we should’ve seen a harsh dip around 1960 Â when in fact we see the exact opposite. Now correlation does not equal causation but it’s a pretty good indicator that the negative isn’t true.
I could go on but the fact is that water fluoridation works incredibly well as a public health policy, greatly helping those who are at risk at developing tooth cavities and even those who’d consider themselves not needing it. Therefore removing it would cause harm to those who can least afford it to happen to them and that’s why bad science reporting like this needs to be exposed for what it is. I know I’m probably preaching to the choir here but I know how hard it can be to debate people who spout nonsense as fact and hope that you can use this as a reference rather than having to disappear down the research hole that I did.
