UK - Southampton Daily Echo

In my view
By Donald Smith of Southampton
Time to listen to the people
Could I venture to suggest that in the article by Olga Senior (In My View, April 22) "the facts on fluoridation", I think the word she required was "fantasies".
I have never heard such a pre-posterous argument put forward to support her so called facts.
According to her, the "fact" that every survey was against the use of fluoride and there were many, some organised by Strategic Health Authority itself, more than 70 per cent against, indicates that this was only the voice of the vociferous and therefore the majority who didn't vote were ergo in favour of its use.
Would I be right I wonder that if those survey results had been in favour by such a percentage she would have reversed her decision because, ergo, the majority were not in favour. Some hopes! She would have proclaimed its result from the rooftops, of that I am quite sure.
One aspect of fluoridation I have not seen mentioned is cost, checking on just the past five years of my water rates I find they have never gone up by less than six per cent and one of those years was more than eight per cent. Are they going to pro-vide this pollutant free? I think not; it will almost certainly become yet another excuse to increase costs.
One other disappointing aspect of this farcical debate is the political one. I understand that both of our MPs and a substan-tial proportion of Southampton councillors supported using fluoride.
Now bear in mind these are the people who eternally exhort us to use our democratic vote at election times, but it seems at other times, like this one, our vote doesn't matter.
As far as I have seen, in spite of the overwhelming opposition expressed, not one of these people has had the moral fibre to stand up and suggest that the will of the people should be respected and the unpopular decision on implementation of fluoride reversed.
I take eight different pre-scribed drugs per day in 13 dif-ferent tablets and insulin, nec-essary to sustain me.
Why should I have to take a totally unnecessary poison, that may not even be compatible, just because some irresponsible parents can't be bothered to see their under-five-year-olds clean their teeth?
And apparently it is only under-fives that are mostly affected, so we are talking about milk teeth anyway.
As a lad back in the twenties and thirties, we were taught at school that if we couldn't afford toothpaste, and we really could-n't in those days, use salt on the tip of our finger to clean our teeth. Not the best idea I admit, but it did work and I still have most all of my teeth, no false ones.
Since I could afford it I have always used good old Eucryl powder, a product originally made in Oakley Road, Southampton.
The one "fact" I do understand is even if fluoride guaranteed excellent teeth and we would all live to be 150, the people do not want it and that view is para-mount and should be respected.
Ian Murray, editor of the daily Echo is absolutely right in calling for a proper vote on the issue.