There’s a controversy brewing in Blount County after the mayor there is now pushing for fluoride to be put in the county’s water system.

Volunteer TV’s Stephen McLamb has more.

One woman with kidney problems is terrified of the prospect that her water supply will be fluoridated.

She says when she left a system that had fluoride her health problems greatly diminished.

“I’ll not be drinking water again. Not out of the faucet if they go through with this.”

For Janet Lail, the thought of putting fluoride in the South Blount Utility District’s water is terrifying.

Stricken with kidney problems, Lail says she used to go to the hospital every couple weeks but when the district began making it’s own water without fluoride.

“In 2005, I was in the hospital one time and in 2006 I was not in the hospital at all.”

She attributes it to getting off fluoridated water.

“Nothing had changed except I was no longer consuming fluoride.”

She’s not alone.

A middle Tennessee state Representative and doctor says he’s sent a letter to all utility districts in the state asking them to take out the fluoride.

“The American Dental Association has been recommending that fluoridated water not be added to infant formula.”

But after several years, Blount county’s mayor wants it in there.

Jerry Cunningham, the Blount County Mayor says, “talking to a lot of my friends in the medical community, the dental community, that it’s just the best thing.”

Cunningham believes there’s no conclusive proof that fluoridated water can be a problem for people who drink it and sent a letter to board members he would not appoint them if they were not for fluoridation.

Cunningham continues, “I’ve got to make the call that’s in the best interest of the health of this community.”

But for Janet Lail, that’s not what she wants to hear.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do I don’t want to go back to that kind of life.”

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