Every day, we eat food comprised of a host of substances. Just look at the often-lengthy ingredient list of any canned, frozen or boxed food.
One thing we think is fairly simple, though, is tap water. We even know its atomic structure: H2O. However, two-thirds of the United States’ drinking water often has a significant amount (0.7 to 1.2 mg/L) of a foreign, potentially harmful substance in it: fluoride.
Fluoride is an ion that comes from the element fluorine. It’s most commonly known as the stuff in toothpaste that helps prevent cavities, but it’s also in many food products like chicken nuggets, baby food, peas and tap water.
Fluoride naturally occurs in ground water at varying levels. For instance, Baton Rouge’s fluoride level is 0.2 mg/L, or 0.2 milligrams of fluoride for every 1 liter of water. A water supply is said to be naturally fluorinated when it contains between 0.7 and 1.2 mg/L.
Towns with a fluoride level within this range usually have better dental hygiene than places outside of this range. Many health organizations, like the World Health Organization and American Medical Association, support artificially fluorinating drinking water.
In Louisiana, only 37 percent of the population has access to fluorinated water. To help the state’s dental health, many want to fluoridate the water, and in 2008, the Louisiana Legislature passed a law requiring water systems to determine the expense of fluoridation.
Ultimately, the cost would be covered by grants or the state’s budget. If 15 percent of a town dissented and petitioned, the community could resist fluoridation.
The expense of this process wouldn’t be too cumbersome for the state. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the infrastructure would cost about 50 cents per person in large communities and $3 per person in smaller towns. For every $1 spent on fluoridation, $38 would be saved in dental treatment costs.
Despite fluoridation’s benefits, many scientists, researchers, dentists and even Nobel laureates oppose the practice. This opposition varies in stance and virulence, but it generally claims fluoridation does not greatly help dental hygiene and contributes to a myriad of health problems like weaker bones and lower IQs in children.
Recently, some of these concerns were confirmed when the CDC reported that overfluoridation was discoloring teeth, and consequently reduced the optimal range from between 0.7 and 1.2 mg/L to just 0.7mg/L. I am unaware of Louisiana’s plans to alter their own fluoridation program’s levels.
I am unqualified to comment on many of fluoride’s health benefits and detriments, but as a researcher of intelligence, I can speak to its effects on children’s IQ. In some studies, fluoride levels at 1.8 mg/L were found to harm children’s cognitive development.
Basically, researchers look at two similar groups of children who, except for one group, has more fluoride in their drinking water. When the group with more fluoride ages, their average IQ is significantly less than that of their peers.
This sort of research is correlational, not causal. In other words, you can’t say definitively that fluoride dampened these kids’ cognitive development. Also, 1.8 mg/L is significantly higher than 0.7 to 1.2 mg/L. Yet, the correlation is quite strong, and when one considers how many foods contain fluoride, adding more to our water seems risky.
Because of the state’s budget situation, fluoridation has lost its steam, but it will probably re-emerge sooner or later.
When it does, remember that children, especially those ages 0-3, are in a critical stage of their cognitive development, and anything that might be harmful should be regarded as such.
This may seem overprotective, but once those years are gone, they are gone forever
Missed chances at cognitive growth are difficult to make up.
This isn’t to say that children’s dental health isn’t important, because it is. It’s just not as important as children’s brain development.
Daniel Winkler is an education doctoral student. He studies brain development in children.
 
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