Highlights
• Fluoride concentrations were determined in UK tea infusions and products.
• UK economy tea contained elevated fluoride, comparable to Chinese brick tea.
• Fluoride concentration significantly varies depending upon the type of tea.
• We report a risk of high exposure to fluoride if consuming 1L/day of Economy tea.
• Tea consumption alone can exceed the dietary reference intake of fluoride.
INTRODUCTION
Although fluoride is commonly added to oral hygiene products to increase the strength of tooth enamel, it also has substantial anti-bacterial effects (Barbier et al., 2010; Li, 2003). For example, when in complex with a divalent metal ion and ADP, fluoride forms a nonfunctional mimic of ATP that can inhibit enolase (Curran et al., 1994; Qin et al., 2006), and similar complexes can inhibit a large diversity of other metabolic enzymes including phosphatases (Barbier et al., 2010; N
