YAKIMA, Wash. — Yakima’s public water system will keep following state fluoride guidelines after the city council voted 6-1 to table a discussion on removing fluoride.
The issue came up at Tuesday’s Yakima City Council meeting. During the public comment period, 11 people spoke in favor of keeping fluoride in the water and one person asked the council to remove it.
Glenn said he brought the idea forward after hearing concerns from people and seeing information online.
“There’s a lot of information on the internet, and there’s a lot of stuff that was talking about fluoride, and that it’s not really a good idea to ingest it. So I had a lot of people that brought that issue up with me,” Glenn said. “And so I thought we would present it and have a discussion at city council.”
Yakima voters approved fluoridation in 1999 and the city started adding fluoride to drinking water in 2000.
Pediatric dentist Joe Wilson explained that fluoride is added to community water systems to help prevent tooth decay and cavities.
“Most studies show that community water fluoridation decreases cavities in baby teeth, primary teeth by about 36% and adult teeth about 25%,” Wilson said.
The city follows the state guideline of 0.7 milligrams of fluoride per liter of water.
“This can be brought up at any time in the future. But, as I listen to the testimony and then with the six one vote, I think that this is probably an issue that we won’t bring up again at city council,” Glenn said.
Original article online at: https://www.nbcrightnow.com/news/yakima-city-council-tables-fluoride-debate-after-public-comments/article_fe6bb9b6-0af7-42fa-bb32-2a7cec59a94f.html