WATER FLUORIDATION NEWS - Israel - Health Minister outlaws fluoridation of all tap water Last year the Israeli Minister of Health passed new regulations ending the nationwide fluoridation mandate, but left open the ability for municipalities to decide the issue for themselves. Since then, she has been aggressively attacked in the media by pro-fluoridation health officials. Because of this pressure, our US sister organisation the Fluoride Action Network sent a letter to the Minister signed by many health professionals from around the world supporting her decision. Today, she announced that she was going to ban fluoridation throughout Israel, no longer giving municipalities a choice. THIS IS GREAT NEWS AND A HUGE VICTORY! jpost/Israel-News/Health-Minister-German-outlaws-fluoridation-of-all-tap-water-371332 Jerusalem Post - 17/8/14 Contrary to the advice of public health and dentistry experts in her own ministry and academia, Health Minister Yael German has decided to prohibit the fluoridation of drinking water around the country. She also issued her decision Sunday in contravention of a letter written exactly two years ago by Prime Minister (and then-official health minister) Binyamin Netanyahu, who told Knesset Interior Committee chairman MK Amnon Cohen that he [Netanyahu] “could not agree to the cessation of fluoridation” of potable water. Netanyahu continued that municipalities had requested to continue their fluoridation of water and that they should be allowed to do so. The Health Ministry introduced mandatory water fluoridation in 1970 in cities, towns and settlements with over 5,000 residents, and indeed, 70 percent of Israelis have received fluoridated water delivered to their taps. But German opposed it as Meretz-Party mayor of Herzliya and stopped it in her city. Just weeks after entering office as health minister, she declared that she would stop fluoridation and, encountering fierce criticism from critics in leading Israeli schools of public health and dentistry and from her own ministry experts, she wavered and suggested as late as June that fluoridation could be an option instead of being outlawed. German’s spokesmen said that only Ireland and Israel require fluoridation of drinking water, but her critics responded that everywhere else is it an option open to all local authorities except where barred completely only in Holland, Sweden and the Czech Republic. German reiterated on Sunday that she recognized the tasteless, colorless gas as very effective in reducing dental cavities, especially among children. But she added that instead of forcing all Israelis to consume fluoridated water to benefit children’s teeth, the delivery system should be changed so each parent can decide and take action individually if they wanted their child to get dental protection. On August 26, regulations to halt all fluoridated will go into effect, and parents would have to act proactively to protect and improve their dental hygiene. The health minister maintained that according to the World Health Organization, there is a decline in dental caries in countries that do not have mandatory fluoridation. But her critics noted that high-income, homogeneous countries have fewer poor families and better dental habits than in Israel. Here, there are many large families including Arab, ultra-Orthodox and other children whose parents have a lower level of health education and cannot afford or are otherwise unable to protect their teeth and who require automatic delivery of fluoride in the drinking water. Prof. Arnon Afek, German’s director-general whom she recently handpicked and who is an expert in pathology and medical administration (but not dentistry or public health), told The Jerusalem Post Sunday that he personally supported the health minister’s decision to prohibit fluoridation. “Mandatory fluoridation is medical treatment. Individuals have the right to decide if they want it or not. The question is not if fluoride is beneficial but how it should be delivered. We cannot force people. It is legitimate that experts in the field oppose the health minister’s decision, but we have a policy,” said the director-general. “The ministry supported it for over 40 years, but this is a new era. The world has changed, and we can educate parents.” Asked about the fact that most of the developed world has been adding vitamin D to all milk products, iodine to salt and folic acid to flour for decades due to their health benefits but that Israel has not yet done so, Afek said that if the ministry decided to do so, “those who didn’t want the supplements could choose not to consume these products. But with fluoridation of tap water, there is no free choice.” German said only one-percent of water supplies are consumed via the tap, thus fluoridation of all potable water was “a waste.” Children should instead be encouraged to brush their teeth twice a day using fluoride toothpaste, she said, and dental clinics, health funds, kindergarten and elementary school teachers, the School Health Service and tipat halav (well-baby) clinics will aim at educating parents about fluoride.
Posted on: Mon, 18 Aug 2014 04:38:13 +0000
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