FLUORIDE IN TABLE SALT

To the editor: - Would it not be less wasteful to put fluorine in minute amounts in our table salt, as has been done with iodine, than to put it in the water supply? Such a small quantity of the water in the mains ever reaches a person´s digestive tract, but most of the salt in salt shakers eventually does.

Z.F. Endress, M.D., Pontiac, Mich.

Answer: - Caries inhibtion by fluoride (about 1 ppm of fluorine) in drinking water has been studied in great detail. No comparable information is available for judging the effect of fluoride added to table salt. The known variations in the consumption of salt by different persons suggests that the latter procedure would not be satisfactory. Furthermore, many drinking waters naturally contain adequate fluoride, and the use of a fluoridized salt would be undesirable in these cases. It is more logical to add iodine to salt, because iodides have a much wider margin of safety than do fluorides. The wastefulness of adding fluoride to a water supply is more apparent than real. The added materials are readily available and inexpensive, and also the labor involved in a carefully controlled program is negligible when computed in terms of the individual child.

Taken from "Queries and Minor Notes", J.A.M.A. 148:87 (Jan. 5) 1952