Manatee County leaders vote to remove fluoride from drinking water

Name: Manatee commissioners voting on water fluoridation
Uploaded: 2025-04-15T09:01:28-04:00
Description: Leaders in Manatee County will vote Tuesday on whether to end water fluoridation. FOX 13’s Kellie Cowan reports.

Manatee commissioners voting on water fluoridation

Leaders in Manatee County will vote Tuesday on whether to end water fluoridation. FOX 13’s Kellie Cowan reports.

BRADENTON, Fla. - Commissioners in Manatee County voted Tuesday to permanently remove fluoride from drinking water – a practice that leaders recently learned has been suspended since 2021 due to broken equipment.

The 5-1 vote officially ends water fluoridation in the county.

Water fluoridation debate in Florida

The backstory:

In November 2024, Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo advised that all cities and counties statewide stop adding fluoride to drinking water, calling it "public health malpractice."

Since then, numerous local governments – including the Manatee County Commission – have either voted to remove fluoride or have taken steps toward doing so. Others, including Hillsborough County and the City of Clearwater, voted to keep fluoridating water.

PREVIOUS: Hillsborough commissioners decline motion that would remove fluoride from water supply

Those against fluoridation say it's an unnecessary additive, and that if people want to use fluoride, it's readily available in dental products.

Critics of fluoride also raise concerns over its potential impact on children's IQ levels. A report cited by Ladapo found very high levels of fluoride in drinking water appear to adversely affect cognitive ability.

The other side:

Supporters of fluoridation say the oft-cited report has been misinterpreted. The metadata analysis did not include any studies of U.S. cities, instead primarily focusing on places in India and China where fluoride levels in drinking water were more than two times that of U.S. drinking water.

The American Dental Association, CDC, and Florida Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics all advocate for fluoride use in public drinking water because of its ability to greatly reduce the prevalence of cavities and dental disease, especially in children.

Fluoride: What is it and why is it added to our drinking water?

Broken equipment in Manatee County

Dig deeper:

Prior to Tuesday's vote, Manatee County's water fluoridation had been suspended for the past four years because of equipment failure – something that commissioners, and the public, only recently learned about.

In January, Manatee County Commissioner Tal Siddique expressed concern that an ordinance simply went unfollowed for that long.

"To me, it's just not acceptable that we have this ordinance in place irrespective of beliefs… that we simply operated an incomplete and broken fluoride application system," Siddique said. "I mean, the question becomes: what else are we not telling people? What else are not cleaning from our water supply? What else are we not doing? What other contaminants are we introducing?"

What's next:

Tuesday's vote makes Manatee County the latest in Florida to remove fluoride from drinking water.

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The Source: Information for this story was gathered by FOX 13's Kellie Cowan, along with details from the Manatee County Commission meeting on April 15, 2025.

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