Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
I put seven of Canada's bottled water brands to the test to uncover the real composition of their contents. Although it's generally safe to consume bottled water in our nation, I wanted to dig deeper. The question is not just about safety, but about which brands offer the best quality, and which ones you might be better off avoiding. I opted for some of the most popular brands including Flow, Nestlé Pure Life, Smartwater, Aquafina, Naya, Dasani and Eska.
Whether Calgary does or doesn’t have fluoride in its water appears to be a fluid situation. Last year, council voted in favour of adding fluoride after a plebiscite question in the municipal election. However, if you think you’ve been drinking it over the last 12 months, you’re mistaken. At the time of the vote, city officials told councillors it would take between 18 and 24 months to complete the work to add the mineral back into Calgarians water. But that timeline may now be extended.
Childhood exposure to fluoride through public tap water isn’t associated with any emotional or behavioural issues, nor any negative executive functioning in adolescent years, according to a new study from Australia. Researchers looked at more than 2,600 children in a longitudinal study that compared children who had spent their lives drinking fluoridated tap water with those who hadn’t, in order to see if exposure to fluoride in drinking water had any negative impacts.
After years without fluoride, parts of Windsor-Essex will have the mineral added back into drinking water systems Wednesday. This week, residents in Windsor, Tecumseh and LaSalle will have fluoride flowing into their water systems for the first time since 2013. Fluoride had been added to the water in Windsor for decades, but in 2013, city councillors voted to discontinue its use.
Calgary will reintroduce fluoride to its tap water after city council voted overwhelmingly in favour of the change Monday. The vote wasn't close, as 13 members of council voted in favour. Two councillors voted against the motion to reinstate fluoride: Andre Chabot of Ward 10 and Dan McLean of Ward 13. Fluoride was removed following a council decision in 2011. However, Calgarians voted 61.61 per cent in favour of resuming fluoridation in last month's civic election. There was majority support for the move in all 14 of the city's wards.
In the shadow of the Rocky Mountains, a public health debate rages. It’s not about vaccines, masks or where people can smoke, though — it’s about fluoride. It’s in our toothpaste and mouthwash, and a common word around dental offices. But in Calgary, it holds a spot in the public consciousness due to decades of advocates on both sides slogging through six plebiscites on whether the city should put fluoride — a mineral found in rocks and dirt — into the water supply to fight tooth decay.
After a year that saw both Regina and Calgary voting to add fluoride to their drinking water, some British Columbians are wondering whether it's time for cities in the province to finally consider fluoridation. About two-thirds of Calgarians who voted in Monday's plebiscite supported the fluoride measure — hopeful news for Dr. Mario Brondani, an associate professor of dentistry at the University of British Columbia and a self-described "passionate advocate for fluoride."
The debate to add fluoride to the city’s drinking water isn’t new for Calgarians but has remained contentious since it was first voted on nearly 70 years ago. Calgary’s civic election is Oct. 18. This will be the seventh time fluoride has been on the ballot in a Calgary municipal election, after being rejected four times between 1957 and 1971, and then approved in 1989 and again in 1998.
The City of Calgary’s upcoming plebiscite on whether or not residents support re-introducing fluoride into the municipality’s drinking water will also have implications in Airdrie. In conjunction with the upcoming municipal election on Oct. 18, voters in Calgary will also answer a plebiscite on whether or not they support the addition of fluoride into their city’s water supply. As Airdrie gets its drinking water from Calgary, the result of the plebiscite will also determine if Airdrie’s water in the future will contain fluoride, according to the City of Airdrie’s manager of community infrastructure, Lorne Stevens. “I know the topic of fluoridation can be quite contentious,” he said. “At the end of the day, we don’t have a team of fluoride researchers or public health experts employed by the City of Airdrie. We rely on the guidance of Health Canada and Alberta Health Services, and both of those entities do recommend fluoridation as a public health measure, focusing on dental health – there’s a whole back story of why that is.”
Millions of Britons are set to have fluoride added to their drinking water following recommendations by the country's chief medical officers [CMOs] aimed at cutting tooth decay. According to The Times, Health Secretary Sajid Javid is “keen to press ahead” with plans to add the mineral to the water supply. And he will gain powers to do so across England under laws going through Parliament. Javid tweeted that it is “good to see UK CMOs examining how water fluoridation can improve oral health & prevent tooth decay which disproportionately affects more deprived groups”.
Some University of Calgary students are urging other students to vote in favour of restoring fluoride in the city's drinking water in this fall's election. Fluoride naturally occurs in some foods and is found in the Bow and Elbow Rivers at a concentration between 0.1 and 0.4 mg/L. Health Canada recommends water be fluoridated to a level of 0.7 mg/L to prevent tooth decay.
Calgary children have been without fluoride in their drinking water since 2011 and their dental health is suffering, according to findings from a University of Calgary study. It compares the dental health of children in Calgary to children in Edmonton, where the municipal water supply is fluoridated. Of the approximately 2,600 Grade 2 students in each city who took part in the study, 55.1 per cent of Edmonton participants had one or more cavities in their baby teeth. In comparison, the number was 64.8 per cent of Calgary children.
"It's just like the chlorine in drinking water. In the right concentration it is protective because it purifies the water, but in a certain concentration chlorine gas has been used in wars because it's deadly." A character in the 1964 movie Dr. Strangelove believed communists were adding fluoride to American water and called it the “the most monstrously conceived and dangerous communist plot” they’ve ever had to face. The movie, which satirizes the Cold War, pokes fun at the thought of water fluoridation being used as a weapon of war.
Regina city council is once again set to discuss adding fluoride to the city's drinking water. It has been an ongoing topic in the city and was last formally discussed in 2016. On Wednesday, Councillors Bob Hawkins, Cheryl Stadnichuk, Andrew Stevens, Lori Bresciani, John Findura, Dan LeBlanc, Terina Shaw, Shannon Zachidniak, Jason Mancinelli and Mayor Sandra Masters are going to bring forward a notice of motion about adding fluoride to the water. This gives the city notice that this will be discussed and debated at the next city council meeting on August 11.
The European Commission took Italy to the EU's top court on Wednesday over the country's failure to provide clean drinking water to its citizens. The Commission said it was suing Italy because in some areas the levels of arsenic and fluoride in drinking water have long exceeded the maximum values allowed by EU law.
Region's top doctor says oral health has suffered without fluoride. If all goes to plan, fluoridated water will be flowing from local taps this fall for the first time in years, according to the top public health doctor for Windsor and Essex County. Dr. Wajid Ahmed, medical officer of health, said that the planned reintroduction of fluoride into the water supply was delayed due to studies done by Enwin Utilities Ltd. water division to ensure that it wouldn't impact ongoing lead control efforts.
You don’t have to be in the health field to appreciate the overwhelming evidence that supports the benefits of adding fluoride into public drinking water. In 2011, Calgary’s city council decided to discontinue fluoridating Calgary’s drinking water. This act came in direct opposition to all prominent health bodies’ recommendations. There are over 70 years of research on fluoridating drinking water, and yet in Calgary, we still have an ongoing debate that is doing nothing but increasing the number of (very preventable) dental cavities in our population.
Despite receiving its water from Calgary through a regional system, Strathmore has been left out of discussions about reintroducing fluoride to the city’s potable water. In 2011, Calgary water fluoridation was discontinued. But in 2019, the City of Calgary started discussions about adding fluoride to the city’s water supply once again. A report to Calgary city council was presented on Dec. 14, 2020, stating that adding fluoride to the water supply would cost about $30 million over two decades, including about $10.1 million in capital expenses, about $1 million per year in operating and maintenance costs, and about $2 million to $4 million in upgrades over that period. The report stated an associated change in water utility rates or service levels are not anticipated, though this is not guaranteed.
According to the report presented to WUC, the additional testing is primarily necessary to determine how fluoride will interact with the phosphoric acid already present in the system as a mechanism to prevent lead from leaching into the water supply. "WUC will be the first known water utility to add fluoride to the drinking supply which already contains phosphoric acid for purposes of lead mitigation," reads an excerpt from the report. "While other utilities have both additives … no other utility (in North American based on research to date) is known to have fluoride added subsequent to the addition of phosphoric acid."
A dental health advocate in Calgary is working to make drinking water fluoridation a campaign issue. There's already one political party on board — the Alberta Party said Friday that if elected, the government will place a greater focus on preventative health, including the fluoridation of municipal drinking water. "Research has shown that fluoride works, and we would encourage municipalities across the province to make the investments necessary to protect their children, their families," said Alberta Party leader Stephen Mandel.
