14 Nov 2014

Comment on Southampton fluoride decision

Following the news that Southampton City Council have withdrawn plans to fluoridate the area's water supplies, Chief Executive of the British Dental Health Foundation, issued the following comment:

"It is disappointing to learn that Southampton City Council has given in to anti-fluoride protestors in the face of clear evidence from Public Health England on the benefits of fluoridation.

"Extensive reports of three and five year-olds with tooth decay - something highly prevalent in this particular region in the UK - have also been ignored. Fluoridating the water supply, an idea the abolished Southampton City Primary Care Trust supported, would have been a significant step in reversing this problem.

"Tooth decay remains the most prevalent chronic disease in both children and adults, even though it is largely preventable. It falls on dental professionals to continue to educate local residents about practices of good oral health. Fluoride varnish treatments in practices, schools and socially deprived areas are the best chance we have to implement preventive measures. We will continue to lobby for nation-wide fluoridation as we believe it is the biggest single action the Government can take to reduce and tackle tooth decay.".....

The fat lady hasn't sung yet by the look of it.
 

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3 comments:

rcannard said...

Yet another Dentist sticking his ore in i wonder if he has looked beyond his fluoride training in dental school,i also wonder if he's even bothered to look at the evidence that's out there which is from highly acclaimed scientists who have held positions greater than his own,surely he's not saying that there all wrong,is he?...Fluoride is not in our water because we said NO, there are far better ways to care for peoples teeth than poisoning the whole community...Really sick and tired of hearing from dentists who never look beyond their training...I guess the the back handers are generous enough to look the other way...Perhaps he needs to implant a conscious instead of teeth...

Doug Cross said...

So this is what 'evidence-based dental science' is about is it? Instead of parroting the desperately tired and discredited fluoride dogma perhaps it would be helpful if these 'dental experts' actually looked at the figures that their own cronies in the NHS produce, at great cost to the public.

I've checked the official statistics, and find that the proportions of 3, 5 and 12 year old kids in Southampton with decay are all indistinguishable from the national averages (for England, that is).

And those for 3 and 12 year olds in Southampton are actually signficantly better than those for the unfortunate kids in Birmingham, where they've been adding fluoride to the water for decades.

Instead of waffling on about how terrible kids' teeth are, and what a shame that fluoridation hasn't been introduced to Southampton, it's time that these 'experts' took some lessons in elementary statistics and simple science, and then got on with doing something a bit more constructive.

Cllr Chris said...

Hi Doug, do you have a link to the relevant part of those English national averages of the Official Statistics? I'd like to do a bit of research there.