After Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo came to Polk County to urge cities and counties to quit adding fluoride to water supplies, a majority of Lakeland’s city commissioners said they would need to learn more before they could vote on the issue.
One commissioner said he would like to end fluoridation, and one said he is learning toward making the change.
Ladapo stood in front of Winter Haven's water treatment plant Friday and called fluoridation a “public health malpractice.” He urged “every county in Florida to stop adding fluoride to their community water systems.”
“We encourage municipalities and counties to look at the guidance to make the decision that is in the best interest of your communities here in Florida, of your local communities,” Ladapo said. “This is something that has been defended for a long time, and it is a public health malpractice to continue doing it.”
Lakeland spokesman Kevin Cook said the city began adding fluoride to the drinking water in 1981, with the City Commission approving the measure in a roll call vote.
“The practice of the addition of fluoride to the public drinking has been questioned over the years, but the benefit of prevention of dental cavities has been the main reason to continue the practice of fluoride addition,” Cook said.
Lakeland adds fluoride at a level of 0.7 milligrams per liter, which is the amount recommended by the U.S. Public Health Service. The World Health Organization has set a “safe limit” for fluoride in drinking water of 1.5 milligrams per liter.
Cook said the city lowered the amount in about 2008 from 0.8 milligrams per liter, the previous recommended level, because of updated public health guidance.
In an informal survey Friday afternoon, most Lakeland city commissioners said they would need more information before making a decision on any formal requests to remove fluoride from the city’s drinking water. Bill Read said he would like to end the practice, and Guy LaLonde Jr. said he leans toward eliminating fluoride.
Their comments:
- Chad McLeod: “Until now, it really hasn’t come up as an issue during my time on the commission. I need to look into it and study it more.”
- Mike Musick: “Let me be honest, I have never really looked into it. Let me do some research.”
- Bill Mutz, mayor: “I am open to considering same with greater understanding.”
- Stephanie Madden, whose son was born without enamel on his teeth and “has suffered” because of it: “I would love to hear pros and cons from our water department.”
- Sara Roberts McCarley: “I am open to having a discussion on our water.”
- LaLonde: “I believe it’s time we revisit this policy. Families deserve access to clean, pure water without unnecessary additives. As a father, husband and community leader, I feel a responsibility to question practices that may no longer serve us as they once did – or perhaps never did at all. I would like to hear more information before any decision would be made, of course.”
- Read: “I have met with our water department several times addressing trying to stop it.”
Winter Haven city commissioners voted 3-2 this month to end fluoridation next year. One commissioner and several community members cited comments against fluoride made by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has since been nominated by President-elect Donald Trump to become secretary of Health & Human Services.
The element fluorine is “abundant in the Earth’s crust as a naturally occurring fluoride compound found in rocks and soil, according to the American Dental Association. As groundwater moves through the Earth, it passes over rock formations and dissolves fluoride minerals, releasing fluoride ions. This increases the fluoride content of the water.
Fluoride occurs naturally in Lakeland’s water supply before it is filtered and chemicals are added, according to a 2022 city water quality report.
Fluoride was detected at 0.06 parts per million in 2020 and that the likely source was from “erosion of natural deposits; discharge from fertilizer and aluminum factories,” according to the report.
“Tooth decay begins when the outer layer of a tooth loses some of its minerals due to acid produced by bacteria in dental plaque breaking down the sugars that we eat,” the ADA website states. “Fluoride protects teeth by reducing demineralization and enhancing remineralization.”
Communities in the United States began fluoridating water in the 1940s to prevent cavities, also called caries, in children and adults. According to the National Institutes of Health, water fluoridation is recommended by nearly all public health, medical and dental organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, U.S. Public Health Service, World Health Organization, and the American Dental Association.
A federal court ruling in September in the case of Food and Water Watch vs. the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency called on the EPA to strengthen regulation of fluoride in drinking water to lower the risk of harm to children’s mental development.
Joining Ladapo in Winter Haven on Friday morning was Ashley Malin, an assistant professor at the University of Florida’s College of Public Health and Health Professions and UF College of Medicine.
Malin was the lead investigator on a research study that explored the association between fluoride exposure in pregnancy and neurobehavioral issues in young children.
The study found that higher fluoride levels in pregnant women are linked to increased odds of their children exhibiting neurobehavioral problems at age 3. The findings are based on an analysis involving 229 predominantly Hispanic women with low income and their children living in Los Angeles County.
Ladapo said he used to believe that it was necessary to add fluoride to drinking water. But he said his opinion changed when he read a National Toxicology Program review of dozens of scientific studies that showed children exposed to higher levels of fluoride, such as drinking water containing more than 1.5 milligrams of fluoride per liter, are associated with lower IQ. That’s more than twice the amount found in Lakeland’s drinking water.
But multiple studies over the last 70 years show that ending fluoridation leads to increased tooth decay, which causes pain, infection, tooth loss, missed school and missed work.
An American Dental Association fact sheet cites various studies, including one in Antigo, Wisconsin, which began fluoridation in June 1949 and ceased doing so in November 1960.
“After five and one-half years without optimal levels of fluoride, second- grade children had a 200% increase in tooth decay experience, fourth- graders a 70% increase and sixth-graders a 91% increase in decay experience compared with the levels of those of the same ages in 1960,” the ADA states. “Residents of Antigo reinstituted water fluoridation in October 1965 on the basis of the severe deterioration of their children’s oral health.”
