Florida's state surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, just went up another notch in my book. He is now recommending that Florida's cities that add fluoride to their water supply reconsider that practice.
Don't get me wrong: I'm not against fluoride as an aid to dental health. And once upon a time I was pleased to have fluoridated water, considering it to be a sign of a progressive city. I now believe I was wrong. (I have been wrong on occasion. Once upon a time I even thought it was a good idea to get the COVID-19 vaccine, a decision which I now regret.)
Maybe there was a point in time when it was a good idea to mass-medicate the population, but looking back, I don't think so. In any case, there are now so many other ways to obtain fluoride for dental purposes that it seems ridiculous to impose it on all the city's water customers. I'm not against fluoride, per se, but I am 100% against government-mandated ingestion of fluoride. Let those who want it avail themselves of the many options available, but let our water be pure and safe! Here's hoping we can convince our city to follow the surgeon general's recommendation.
In this I do envy our Swiss family, whose city water comes out of the tap as it comes out of the ground: no fluoride, no chlorine, just great-tasting, pure water.
UPDATE: I wrote to our mayor and our city commissioners, and received a response from the city manager, with whom I have already clashed on the issue of recycling. It was not encouraging. He hastens to reassure me that "you will be happy to know that the levels in our water [are] far lower than the level of fluoride in the study that concerned the Surgeon General," and "we are guided by the science." Well, no, that does not make me particularly happy. Any level of added fluoride is at best outdated, as fluoride for dental purposes is readily available in many forms for those who want it. Medicating the population, en masse and often against their will, is not an acceptable function of government.
Plus, the phrase "we are guided by the science" automatically raises red flags, as all too often it translates to, "we are guided by the pronouncements of whatever authorities we choose to follow," with little regard for how the process of science actually works. This is the same city manager who, when I asked where the materials that the city collects for recycling actually end up, showed no interest in what happens to it once the city passes it on to another agency.
I guess there's more work to be done. I hate politics, but the least I can do is speak up, so they can't insist that they must be right because no one is objecting.
