The push to remove fluoride from drinking water may be gaining momentum in Florida, but the pitch from the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis received a mostly lukewarm reception in Miami on Tuesday morning. Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo was the featured guest of Miami-Dade’s Health and Safety Committee, urging county commissioners to end what he described as “a harmful” practice “that doesn’t make sense.”
“I personally am convinced that this nation as a whole will stop water fluoridation in the near future because it truly just defies any type of sensibility to continue doing it,” said Ladapo, a Harvard-trained physician who was named Florida’s top health official by DeSantis in 2021. Democrats on the officially nonpartisan board were the least receptive to Ladapo’s presentation, which runs counter to the scientific consensus that tiny amounts of fluoride in drinking water is both safe and a boon to dental health.
“The results you’re sharing are from one side,” Commissioner Marleine Bastien said after the 30-minute presentation on the alleged risks of fluoride in drinking water. “I have a ton of research producing a completely different view.”
A fellow Democrat, Commissioner Eileen Higgins, didn’t attend most of the fluoride symposium that was arranged by the committee’s chair, Commissioner Roberto Gonzalez, a Republican first appointed to the commission by DeSantis to fill a vacancy. When she returned to the chambers, Higgins suggested the committee tackle other issues on the agenda. “It would be nice to move on to the actual business of the county,” she said.
No votes were taken on fluoride Tuesday, but the meeting highlighted the dividing line facing elected officials across Florida and the country as they try to sort through conflicting studies on what’s best for the public.
While the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared water fluoridation one of the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century, the Cabinet secretary now overseeing that agency for President Donald Trump, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has called for removing fluoride from water supplies. A federal judge last fall instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to address fluoride risks after citing a U.S. report on studies linking high fluoride amounts in water to lower IQ scores for children. Major medical groups, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, stuck with their backing of fluoride as a public-health tool, saying the broad scientific consensus still considers the mineral safe at the tiny doses used by water supply systems. “Even in an era with widespread availability of fluoride from various sources, studies show that community water fluoridation prevents at least 25% of tooth decay in children and adults throughout their life span,” the American Dental Association said in a statement last fall. “The scientific weight of sound evidence around the benefit of community water fluoridation is clear and compelling.” Ladapo and three other advocates against fluoride in drinking water were given rare VIP treatment at the committee hearing, addressing commissioners from a table set up before the dais, microphones and nameplates before them. Speakers at commission meetings typically stand at lecterns to address the board.
They argued fluoride in toothpaste fights tooth decay well enough that members of the public deserve the right to choose whether they want to drink the substance, too. Gonzalez has asked county lawyers to draft legislation ending Miami-Dade’s nearly 70-year practice of adding fluoride to drinking water to help prevent cavities. But that legislation hasn’t made it an agenda, making Tuesday’s meeting a chance to talk about fluoride but not to vote on it.
A Republican commissioner, Raquel Regalado, used her time at the mic to praise Miami-Dade’s water supply and urge the public to have confidence in the scientists charged with keeping tap water safe. “Water and Sewer does keep an eye on the research,” she said. “I just want everyone to have clarity in the quality of Miami-Dade County water. We have a tremendous staff that works on that.”
Democrats have a one-seat advantage on the 13-member commission, so Republican support would likely be crucial for Gonzalez passing legislation to rid county drinking water of fluoride. The more likely scenario may come out of the Republican controlled Legislature in Tallahassee, where there’s a proposal to make it illegal for local governments to add fluoride to tap water. Ladapo’s County Hall appearance added Miami-Dade to the list of local governments pulled into a fluoride fight that activists have helped spread across Florida. Scott Kiley, a leader of the Stand for Health Freedom advocacy group out of Naples, told commissioners that Miami-Dade is the latest jurisdiction to be targeted for its fluoridation program.
“In Collier County, we ended water fluoridation five to zero,” We moved on to the city of Naples, where we ended water fluoridation with a vote of five to two.” He ticked off other jurisdictions that agreed to rid drinking water of fluoride, telling the committee: “Citizens want informed consent.”
Several parents from Broward County led a group of home-schooled children to the Miami-Dade chambers for the meeting. The children waited about three hours to read their remarks to commissioners in a hearing that the adults said they couldn’t get in their home county. “We tried to get it on the Broward agenda,” said Cynthia Pfaff, a Davie resident. “So we came to Dade. With Dade being the hub it is, we figured if we could get [fluoride] removed here, we could it get removed from other counties.”
Original article online at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article301792024.html