Nashville suburb officially ends water fluoridation

Thursday, September 01, 2011 by: Jonathan Benson, staff writer
Tags: fluoridation, Nashville, health news

(NaturalNews) A few weeks ago NaturalNews reported that officials from Spring Hill, Tenn., a fast-growing suburb of Nashville, were considering ending the city's water fluoridation program. We are excited to report that, according to a recent report in The Tennessean, these same city leaders have officially and unanimously decided to stop fluoridating the city's public water supply beginning on November 1, a move that will save taxpayers more than $21,000 a year.

It all began when various individuals, including Spring Hill's water superintendent Caryl Giles, began questioning the city's Board of Mayor and Aldermen about the need to fluoridate water. This sparked Alderman Amy Wurth, along with several others, to help lead the charge in removing fluoride from Spring Hill's water supply, contending that because not everybody reacts the same way to its ingestion, forcing it on the entire population is wrong.

"I think we have to be responsible as parents and look at other options for fluoridation, but not put it in the water where it's not needed," said Alderman Keith Hudson, who supports Wurth and the others contentions that water fluoridation is outdated, expensive, and not even necessarily backed by sound science.

Reports indicate that fluoridation of Spring Hill's water will officially end on September 30, 2011, which is several months shy of officials' earlier estimates for its potential removal. Spring Hill's water department will also send out a public notice within 30 days of this date to its nearly 30,000 residents, notifying them of the change.

This historic move by a large metropolitan suburb to end water fluoridation is a significant one that could snowball into many other communities following its lead, particularly those in states like Tennessee that do not have statewide mandated fluoridation laws.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20110818/W...