Florida surgeon general urges end to fluoride in water, citing children’s health risks

PENSACOLA, Fla. — The longstanding debate on adding fluoride to water systems is front and center again.

Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo is advising local governments to stop adding fluoride to water supplies across the state. He even called it “public health malpractice.”

However, public health agencies still support the practice, saying it’s vital to dental health in communities.

“Seems to be there’s two sides to the issue,” said Bruce Woody, executive director of Emerald Coast Utilities Authority. “Obviously on the opposite end right now there’s folks who have concerns about the health affects to children.”

Ladapo says that fluoride “increases the risk of neuropsychiatric disease in children and reduces their IQ.”

In September, a federal judge ruled that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency needs to further regulate the amount in water because of the potential risks.

This comes after the EPA lowered its maximum recommendation back in 2015.

“The EPA dropped their recommended levels from 1.0 to 0.7,” Woody said. “While the EPA regulates the maximum levels that can be in water, they don’t require by permit a minimum, by so there’s some communities that have none.”

Most communities do have it, including Escambia County.

“We were kind of right around that range anyways, so we didn’t have to change anything,” Woody said. “We were on the low end of that.”

Still, many other countries do not fluoridate their water, including most countries in western Europe, China, Japan, and Israel.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — president-elect Trump’s pick for secretary of health and human services — is another staunch supporter of removing fluoride .

When the subject originally came up in Escambia County in 1998, there was a fight against it, although it ultimately failed.

But with all the fights against the practice, why is it still recommended to keep it?

“The American Dental Association has long stated that community water fluoridation is safe and beneficial to oral health,” Woody said.

Government health agencies also back it, including the EPA as well as the CDC, which says this:

“They actually call fluoride one of the 10 greatest public health achievements of the 20th century.”

These agencies credit fluoridated water to preventing tooth decay and a dramatic decline in cavities after 1945.

ECUA says until told otherwise by its board, they will continue to follow the recommendations from the EPA and CDC until further scientific evidence is available.