Oh no…
Tauranga will fluoridate its water despite mayor voting no
New Mayor of Tauranga Mahé Drysdale has voted against adding fluoride to Tauranga’s water.
The Olympic rowing champion says he has “real question marks around safety” and wants more assurances it did not pose a risk, despite health authorities saying community water fluoridation is a safe and effective way to reduce tooth decay.
Tauranga’s water will be fluoridated by October 24 after a majority of councillors supported the move at a council meeting on Monday.
It must do so to comply with the director general of health’s directive to fluoridate for 30 days before November 30 or risk a fine of up to $200,000 plus $10,000 per day if non-compliance continued.
The fluoridation directive first made by then-director general of health Dr Ashley Bloomfield in 2022 said he had considered the scientific evidence and was “satisfied that community water fluoridation is a safe and effective public health measure that significantly reduces the prevalence and severity of dental decay”.
It has been continued by current director general of health, Dr Diana Sarfati, who last month denied the council’s request for a deadline extension.
…ummmmmm.
Ahhhhhh.
Tauranga mayor Mahé Drysdale is an anti-fluoridation cultist?
Oh dear.
This rise in antiscience quackery has captured provincial voters and its the same pool NZF fish in with their anti-vax lunatic fringe.
When ignorance gets elected, it is the obligation of the professionals to invoke the legislative punishments required to force the pitchforked rabble back into their pig pens lest the library get burnt.
Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice – please donate here.
Maybe he is being cautious as a result of the research of this recent article in The Guardian that summarises the research linking fluoride in water with lower IQ in children.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/aug/23/fluoride-water-study
Maybe its quackery or maybe adding fluoride to municipal water supplies does have effects other than preventing tooth decay. However, its good to see assumptions being challenged.
Martyn – Fluoride is a waste product from Heavy metal processing…
So is Climate change.
We are all formed of waste products from the earth (a mix of Eros and of dust as WH Auden put it.) Think further as we need help if we are to survive with practical and wise measures.
So is water.
Richard Christie – Untrue
The mayor can think what ever they like but when it comes to the crunch they are only one vote .He would best leave it alone and move on as the majority have voted as they think which is how it is meant to be .The mayor is there to ensure every one gets a say not to push their own private agenda like the current PM is doing .
Correct Gordon as we see in Wellington with the Mayor copping all the shit because a majority of councillors for some strange reason changed their minds.
The Tauranga people will regret voting for someone because of his fame as opposed to his real life skills and business acumen. To vote in someone who for most of his life has been told what to eat and when, told when to get up and what to do every minute of his day in the pursuit of fame will come back and bite them in the arse. How many of these people would have voted for Mahe if he had been a 35 year old Maori financial advisor carpetbagger from Cambridge.
Anti fluoridation activists get caught out lying and misleading on the facts repeatedly but never pause or reverse their stance, they simply roll out an equally invalid line of misrepresentation. and ignore the mess they’ve already left on the floor.
It’s the modus operandi of those who start with firm conclusions and then look for any supportive evidence, or, manufacture it to suit their immutable conclusions.
It’s the opposite of the scientific method which generally collects evidence firs to test hypotheses (i.e. they are falsifiable)
Get used to an underlying fact about sportspeople – they are very driven, they follow their own drives and targets unflinchingly, and they are self-centred as they have to be to get the best from their own minds and bodies to perform some ultimately unimportant task which they have set as their goal. NZ schools have long been more interested in turning out good sportspeople than wise and knowledgable philosophers, informed in psychology and sociology etc. So you reap what you sow, ergo etc. Am I the first to scale this Everest of knowledge, understanding and comprehension of the NZ national psyche?
What’s cultist about being antifloridation in the town supply? If people want fluoride, get from the chemist like my parents did don’t foist it on everyone. Choices.
Yeah, and about it being a heavy metal by product…
Did you get that news about the comet that hasn’t been around for thousands of years? Saw it on RadioNZ RNZ. Fascinating about the earth and space and what the hell we do while we have form eh!
I don’t think I’ve ever really got a wisp of meaning, let alone right, from a Greywarbler comment that made it sensible to me.
My most communicative nephew came out as anti-fluoridization on Fbook. It is such a concern for my small hunter-gatherer mind that I don’t care. I suggested he first google ‘Anti-fluoridization Debunked’ before posting. He responded he doesn’t believe in conspiracy theories and seeks firmer evidence unlike my siblings.
Are there any grounds to anti-fluoride — yep, I still can be bothered googling it.