November is Native American Heritage Month, which celebrates the history, heritage, traditions, and contemporary way of life of Native Americans, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians. It is also a time to raise a general awareness about the unique challenges and inequities native people have faced both historically and in the present, and the ways in […]
Search Results for: disparities
Two Decades of Persisting Income Disparities in Dental Caries Among US Children and Adolescents
Guest Blog Post by Lourdes M. Secola, DMD, MScD, DDS, Cert.PH West Maple Pediatric Dentistry. Omaha, NE Dental caries – known to most of us as tooth decay – continues to be the most common preventable disease of childhood. And the poorer you are, the worse your dental disease is likely to be. When that […]
Oral Health Equity: Building Coalitions to Tackle Disparities
By: Ashley Suchyta, Campaign for Dental Health Intern This was my second year helping prepare the Campaign for Dental Health annual fluoridation meeting. This year’s meeting, on the theme of Oral Health Equity: Building Coalitions to Tackle Disparities, could have not gone better. The main purpose of the Campaign for Dental Health is to promote […]
A Perfect Smile Comes at a Cost: How Poverty and Food Insecurity Cement Disparities in Oral Health
Contributed by Qadira Ali Huff, MD, MPH Overview- Why This Matters: A picture-perfect smile falls just out of reach for many children living in poverty. Dental caries is the most common chronic childhood disease, and the burden of dental caries falls disproportionately on low-income and minority children (Dye et al. 2012). Children living in poverty […]
A Call to Expand Fluoridation in Britain
In the United Kingdom, the Association of Directors of Public Health (ADPH) is urging the government to pursue six strategies to reduce disparities in children’s oral health. One of the six strategies advanced by ADPH is to increase the number of community water fluoridation programs. ADPH describes fluoridation as “the single most effective public health […]
Flint, Lead, Communities of Color, and Health Equity
The Campaign for Dental Health has been tracking the safe drinking water crisis in Flint, Michigan since water fluoridation advocates sounded the alarm in early 2015. At that time, environmental activist Erin Brockovich wrote a post on Facebook that questioned the use of funds to fluoridate the city’s water. (Brockovich has consistently but wrongly impugned […]
Troubled Waters in Flint
Contributed by: Brittany Seymour, DDS, MPH, with acknowledgements to Janice Cho and Brittanie Dillon We may not have consensus on the definition of social justice, or how to achieve it, but certainly we can agree what’s transgressed in Flint, Michigan is a true mark of social injustice. Over a decade ago, financial crises paved the […]
The Cochrane Review of Community Water Fluoridation
In October 2000, the U.S. Community Preventive Services Task Force recommended community water fluoridation (CWF). In April 2013, the Task Force reaffirmed this recommendation and cited “strong evidence” of CWF’s ability to reduce the rate of tooth decay. A new review by the Cochrane Oral Health Group Review concludes that the introduction of CWF “resulted […]
Common questions about fluoride
1. What do we know about fluoride and fluoridation? Fluoride exists naturally in nearly all water supplies. Water is “fluoridated” when a public water system adjusts the fluoride to a level that is optimal for preventing tooth decay. About 75 percent of Americans whose homes are connected to public water systems receive fluoridated water. However, […]
What do health experts say?
American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) “The American Academy of Family Physicians supports fluoridation of public water supplies as a safe, economical, and effective method to prevent dental caries.” American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) “Tooth decay is the most common chronic disease of childhood, and water fluoridation is one of the most important public health […]
