Utah became the first state to ban the addition of fluoride to public drinking water after Gov. Spencer Cox [pictured right] signed the law late Thursday night. The ban will take effect on May 7.
Rep. Stephanie Gricius, who sponsored the bill, said in an email to The Defender that she was thrilled the governor signed it. She said:
“The proper role of government is to provide safe, clean drinking water, not mass medicate the public. While we have banned it from being added to our water systems, we have also increased access to fluoride tablets through the pharmacies so any Utahn who wishes to take it may. But it will now be a decision each individual can make for themselves.”
The new law bans water fluoridation, but also gives pharmacists new authority to prescribe fluoride supplement pills. Typically, such pills can be prescribed only by a dentist or physician.
“What Utah has accomplished is historic, a huge step forward,” said Rick North, board member of the Fluoride Action Network (FAN), which won a landmark ruling in a lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for the agency’s failure to appropriately regulate the chemical.
North said Utah’s law “is a milestone for public health in the country and part of a nationwide trend toward removing this toxin from our water.”
Cox signed the bill amid growing opposition to water fluoridation across the country, driven by new research published in top journals showing that fluoride exposure is linked to lowered IQ in children and other negative neuro-cognitive effects — even at fluoridation levels currently recommended by the public health agencies.
The research also indicates that water fluoridation has little to no effect on dental health.
Utah provided a ‘working scientific study’
Dentist Griffin Cole, conference chairman of the International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology, said Utah provided a “working scientific study” showing that fluoride had no positive effects on dental health because almost half the state already didn’t fluoridate its water.
“They were able to look at decay rates in areas that were fluoridated and areas that weren’t,” he said, “and there was no difference.”
Cox similarly pointed this out in comments to ABC4 Utah earlier this month.
“You would think you would see drastically different outcomes with half the state not getting it and half the state getting it,” Cox told ABC4. “I’ve talked to a lot of dentists. We haven’t seen that. So it’s got to be a really high bar for me if we’re going to require people to be medicated by their government.”
Kathleen Thiessen, Ph.D., who co-authored the 2006 National Resource Council study on fluoride toxicity, said she hopes more states will follow Utah’s example....