Importance of Community Water Fluoridation:
Despite my general support for the information and positions presented in this fact sheet, I do not think the following sentence is accurate: “Having healthy teeth requires access to fluoridated drinking water, a healthy diet, good oral hygiene, appropriate use of fluoridated toothpaste and regular dental check-ups”. As it is written, this sentence implies that ALL of these measures need to be in place in order for a person to have healthy teeth. Such an implication can be easily disproved by the existence of people with “healthy teeth” living in non-fluoridated areas. In my opinion, this inaccurate sentence leaves the overall statement open to criticism. Perhaps a better form of the sentence would be: “While drinking water fluoridation has clearly proven benefits, additional measures are also required to maintain healthy teeth. These include a combination of healthy diet, good oral hygiene, appropriate use of fluoridated toothpaste and regular check-ups”.
Ethical issues:
The boxed statement refers to community water fluoridation as “safe”, “effective” and “ethical”. The accompanying fact sheet then goes on to provide some justification and discussion for “safe” and “effective”. However, the issue of “ethical” is notably absent from any further discussion. The NHMRC may feel that being ethical is implied by the fact that it is “safe” and “effective”. However, the issue of ethics around “mass medication” is often a key concern for community members. As such, I feel that some justification for why NHMRC considers CWF to be ethical would be appropriate.
FIGURE 1:
The caption says “at 0.6 mg/L or above”. Is there any reason not to simply say “at 0.6-1.2 mg/L"? If it is because of naturally occurring higher concentrations, perhaps this issue should be discussed at some point?
Supporting Documents, Other useful resources. References:
Some of the URLs are in these lists are live (ie, one can click on them with a mouse). Others are just plain text (not live URLs). I suggest that this be corrected so that all of the URLs are “live”.
