Wisconsin Dental Association leader calls for more fluoride research

WISCONSIN – In Wisconsin and many other parts of the nation, community opposition to fluoridation is gaining steam, leaving some consumers wondering what kind of water they should drink.

Wisconsin Dental Association President Thomas Reid, who for years has supported community fluoridation, now is calling for more research on fluoride in dental health.

“There is a heightened awareness of community fluoridation with the new Health and Human Services Director Robert F. Kennedy and the EPA lawsuit,” he said, referring to the Food and Water Watch v U.S. Environmental Protection Agency case Peshtigo resident Brenda Staudenmaier was a plaintiff in.

The City of Peshtigo is among about 14 Wisconsin municipalities that have decided to stop adding fluoride to their public water systems in 2024 and 2026, according to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services.

With more communities moving away from fluoridation, it presents an opportunity to study fluoride’s effects, Reid said. “What I would encourage is more research on the matter. There is no reason we can’t continue to do more research on this,” Reid said May 9 to a reporter. “Transparency is beneficial.”

His remarks followed news of Florida lawmakers’ overwhelming 88-27 support for a state farm bill prohibiting most contaminants in water, including fluoride. If Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signs the legislation, it could make Florida the second state to go anti-fluoridation.

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox signed into law an anti-fluoridation law that took effect May 7. It bars municipalities from adding fluoride to public water systems, but allows Utah residents to take fluoride supplements or add fluoride to the water they drink on an individual basis.

Reid, a practicing dentist at East Grove Dental in Madison, recommends fluoride tablets for those without fluoridated water.

Fluoride dental treatments or prescription fluoride toothpaste are other recommended options for people without fluoridated water who want to use fluoride, he said.

“It should be fascinating going forward to study the state of Utah. We have this entire state which has banned all community fluoridated efforts,” Reid said.

Utah was the first state to bar community water fluoridation. The decision followed U.S. District Court Judge Edward Chen’s ruling that fluoride at a level of 0.7 mg/liter poses an “unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment;” based on a preponderance of evidence, according to the court documents.

Judge Chen cited Section 6(a) of the Toxic Substances Control Act and ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator to begin rulemaking to address the issue.

“Millions of susceptible individuals are exposed to fluoride and the exposure is frequent and long-lasting,” Chen said. The judgment cited research indicating about 200 million Americans have fluoride intentionally added to their drinking water at a concentration of 0.7 mg/L, a level the EPA allows. The EPA’s maximum contaminant level for fluoride is 4 mg/liter, despite the U.S. Public Health Service’s decision to reduce the recommended level of fluoride in drinking water to 1.2 mg/L after evidence in 2006 linked fluoride to severe enamel fluorosis, risk of bone fracture and potential skeletal fluorosis, according to the judgment.

“I would highly support more research in the field of dental health. Any additional research would be fantastic,” Reid said. Most recent research focuses on fluoride’s health effects, or its side effects, on other parts of the body and neurological system.

Reid also spoke of the importance of dosage, yet opponents of fluoridation have pointed out no one knows how much fluoride they’re consuming. Those who drink more milk might be consuming less fluoride on a daily basis than people who don’t drink any milk.

People in warmer climates might have a different daily dose of fluoride because they might be consuming more liquids than people in cooler climates.

“I don’t know that we can regulate the amount of milk people are consuming,” Reid said.

In Wisconsin, dairy farmers are accustomed to nonfluoridated water, according to the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation. Its farmer members use well water, not fluoridated municipal water, according to Amy Eckelberg, executive director of public relations.
“Our members care deeply about water quality and it is frequently discussed in meetings,” Eckelberg said.

Throughout the state, about 730 community water systems do not provide “optimally fluoridated water,” while 295 community water systems provided fluoridated water. Among those adding fluoride, 180 add fluoride, 51 obtain it from another source, and 63 have natural levels of at least 0.7 mg/liter, said Jennifer Miller, communications specialist-advanced at the Wisconsin Department of Health Services.

On the whole, the Wisconsin Department of Health Services continues to support water fluoridation, she said. “Our recommendation continues to support the scientific evidence that community water fluoridation at the recommended level of 0.7 milligrams of fluoride per liter of water (mg/L) in the United States provides a benefit to the public’s health,” Miller said.

“In making this recommendation, we rely on findings across the entire body of scientific evidence, as single studies alone have a variety of study designs and limitations that must be taken into consideration as we analyze and compare results,” Miller said. Judge Chen said he reviewed dozens of studies before writing his opinion.
In many rural communities in Wisconsin, nonfluoridated water is the status quo. In the City of Oconto Falls, for example, City Administrator Peter Wills said fluoridation occasionally comes up for discussion. “Approximately seven or eight years ago, there was a discussion about fluoride, basically an open hearing with the public. They had expressed they did not want the fluoride added to their water,” he said.

This might leave some residents at odds with their dentists. Oconto Falls resident Bill LaBrosse said he has lived on a farm with a private well so didn’t drink the city water. “It’s never come up as an issue for me,” he said. He said his dentist wants him to drink fluoridated water, so he’s been drinking bottled water. But now some people have told him plastic particles in the water could be an issue.
Many people don’t know what to drink because bottled waters aren’t required to state on the label their fluoride content.

Meanwhile, some suburbs and towns located near fluoridated cities are reconsidering their fluoride levels in the wake of new research.

The Village of DeForest north of Madison stopped adding fluoride to its water in March after the Village Board voted 4-3 to halt fluoridation.

Staudenmaier was among those urging trustees to consider the latest research, which prompted a U.S. District Court judge to order the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to review its maximum contaminant level for fluoride, which currently is 4 mg/liter. Reid was opposed to Staudenmaier’s position during the February Village Board meetings.

Florida’s Farm Bill quietly bans the use of fluoride in community water systems. The bill doesn’t appear to mention the word “fluoride,” but prohibits certain additives in a water system that don’t improve water quality. Some substances used to prevent or remove contaminants may be allowed.

The strong support for the bill in both chambers might reflect growing awareness that fluoride is classified as a contaminant, and not a nutrient.