SCIENCE NEWS – Warren Loeppky has been a pediatric dentist in the Canadian city of Calgary for 20 years.
Over the last decade, he says, tooth decay in children he’s seen has become more common, more aggressive and more severe. Many of his young patients have so much damage that he has to work with them under general anesthesia.
“It’s always sad seeing a young child in pain,” Loeppky says. “Dental decay is very preventable. It breaks your heart to see these young kids that aren’t able to eat.”
Loeppky notes that many factors can contribute to tooth decay in children, including their diet and genetics. Still, he believes part of the problem is linked to a decision made in the halls of local government: In 2011, Calgary stopped adding fluoride to its drinking water.
“This decision of city councilors was surprising to the general public, but shocking and alarming to dentists, to pediatricians, to anesthesiologists and others in the health care field, who knew what it would mean,” says Juliet Guichon, a legal and ethics scholar at the University of Calgary who formed a group that advocated for adding fluoride back to drinking water in the city.
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Several studies have shown that fluoride is a safe and effective way to prevent tooth decay. It recruits other minerals, such as calcium and phosphate, to strengthen tooth enamel and fend off acid made by bacteria. Oral health can also affect a person’s overall health.
In 2022, the CDC reported that 63 percent of Americans received fluoridated water.
But that practice now is coming under new scrutiny. In March, Utah became the first state to ban fluoridation; many local governments across the country are also debating the issue.
And on April 7, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told news reporters that he planned to tell the CDC to stop its recommendation …