When Washburn, North Dakota’s town commissioners decided in January to take up the issue of whether or not to continue fluoridating the water supply for the town’s 1,300 residents, they anticipated researching the risks versus benefits and putting the matter to a vote.
What they didn’t anticipate — but soon encountered — was evidence of a coordinated effort by state actors and a national fluoride lobby group, using federal money, to crush local efforts by small towns like Washburn to stop fluoridating their water supplies.
On Monday night, town commissioners voted 4-1 to stop adding fluoride to Washburn’s water supply — making Washburn the latest in a growing list of communities across the country to end the practice in light of mounting scientific evidence that the chemical harms children’s health and provides little or no dental benefit.
At the meeting, Commissioner Keith Hapip shared what he said was evidence of astroturfing by Dr. Johnny Johnson, president of the American Fluoridation Society; Jim Kershaw, Bismarck, North Dakota’s water plant superintendent and others.
“Astroturfing is when a group with money and power pretends to be regular folks supporting something, but it’s really a planned push from the top,” Hapip said. “Real grassroots come from the community naturally. And here, the oral health program used CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] cash to manufacture support for fluoridation in Washburn.”
Johnson phoned into the meeting to advocate for water fluoridation. In response, the commission also hosted a presentation by Michael Connett — the attorney who represented the plaintiffs who won alandmark ruling in a lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for the agency’s failure to appropriately regulate fluoride use in water supplies.
Dr. Griffin Cole, conference chairman of the International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology, who has expertise on fluoride’s toxic effects, also made a presentation.
Interviews by The Defender with grassroots actors across the country revealed that for years, Johnson, one of the country’s foremost advocates of water fluoridation, has been intervening in grassroots efforts to end fluoridation in their communities.
He and colleagues — in this case, Kershaw — travel physically or virtually to meetings in towns across the country.
Hellbound and Down 