Well being and Human Providers Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is increasing his campaign to show again the clock on federal well being coverage.
Having undermined the authorities’s assist for childhood vaccines amid the worst measles outbreak in years, he’s now focusing on one other longstanding pillar of American public well being: water fluoridation.
HHS will convene a board of consultants to evaluate the federal authorities’s advice that communities fluoridate their water, the company introduced on Monday. The Environmental Safety Company is concurrently launching a evaluate of the science on fluoride’s well being results.
The tip results of these inquiries appears to be a foregone conclusion: Kennedy informed the Related Press that he wished the federal government to cease recommending fluoridation. He has referred to as fluoride “industrial waste” and blamed it for an array of well being situations, from neurological injury in youngsters to bone most cancers.
Banning fluoride is an integral a part of Kennedy’s marketing campaign to Make America Wholesome Once more. The information of the critiques got here on the identical day he appeared in Salt Lake Metropolis to reward Utah for being the first state to formally ban water fluoridation.
”It is mindless to have it in our water provide,” Kennedy informed reporters. “I’m very, very happy with this state for being the primary state to ban it, and I hope many extra will come.”
The complicated science on water fluoridation, briefly defined
Water fluoridation, which the US authorities has supported since 1950, has lengthy been thought of a serious public well being win. The Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention reported as not too long ago as final yr that, based mostly on the perfect obtainable proof, fluoride in water reduces tooth decay by 25 % for kids and adults. About three in 5 People now drink fluoridated water from their group water system.
Considerations about fluoridated water’s well being results have been round for many years, too, notably amongst conspiracy-minded people like Kennedy. Like many conspiracies, it has some foundation in actuality — however the actuality is much extra nuanced than Kennedy’s new name for banning it outright would recommend.
As neuroscientist Celia Ford lined for Vox final yr, questions round fluoridated water started rising after the US Nationwide Toxicology Program said with “reasonable” confidence that publicity to elevated fluoride ranges may cut back IQ in youngsters.
That’s a discovering value taking severely — however solely in context. The elevated fluoride ranges that have been studied within the report have been above 1.5 milligrams per liter — greater than twice the present federal pointers for the way a lot fluoride communities ought to add to their water. The measurement of the impact was additionally pretty small, amounting to 1 to 2 factors.
The true concern is for the small minority of individuals, about 1.9 million, who dwell close to a group water supply that already incorporates greater than that 1.5 milligrams per liter of naturally occurring fluoride. (These of us may need to take into account a water filter, Ford wrote.)
As for Kennedy’s different claims, resembling fluoridated water’s supposed hyperlinks to most cancers, the CDC has stated research of most cancers in areas with excessive pure ranges of fluoride have discovered no connection.
The precise injury RFK Jr.’s campaign towards fluoride may do
Whereas Kennedy will be the US’s prime well being official, he doesn’t have the ultimate phrase on whether or not People can entry fluoride to cut back the chance of cavities. States and localities management group water programs that serve most People. Hawaii, as an example, has by no means authorized water fluoridation, although the observe is just not outright banned.
That may reduce each methods: Kennedy has stated he hopes different states and cities observe Utah’s lead, and his assist may embolden some state and native officers to maneuver ahead with their very own bans. However he can not change state legal guidelines on fluoridation; some states, California and Illinois amongst them, require cities of a sure measurement to fluoridate their water. They don’t appear prone to take cues from Kennedy.
The excellent news is that even when Kennedy can efficiently encourage extra states to embrace his anti-science platform and take away fluoride from their water provide, the final word impact on folks’s dental well being may finally be restricted. One latest evaluate of the scientific literature famous that water fluoridation research carried out after 1975, when fluoride was launched in toothpastes, have discovered much less of an impact on tooth decay than earlier research had.
However even when the sensible influence of Kennedys’ campaign could also be marginal, it could possibly nonetheless be influential: A plurality of People, 41 %, stated in a January 2025 Ipsos ballot they didn’t know whether or not fluoride was dangerous and useful. Now the nation’s prime well being official is asking for it to be banned. And the impact of such a ban would fall disproportionately on the least advantaged — one in 4 youngsters dwelling beneath the federal poverty line expertise untreated tooth decay.
Mixed together with his actions towards vaccines, the concern stays that Kennedy’s reckless overhaul of longstanding public well being suggestions may undermine public belief in and assist for a variety of public well being efforts, some way more vital than water fluoridation.