By Tom Fudge
January 31, 2011

SAN DIEGO — Dentists rejoice.  San Diego has joined the fluoridation band wagon. The city water department says it’ll turn on the pumps tomorrow and start adding fluoride to local tap water. With that, San Diego will no longer have the largest municipal water service in the country that does not fluoridate its water.

Fluoridation will begin at the Miramar Water Treatment Plant, one of three water plants run by the city. A city press release tells us on the following week the process will begin at the Alvarado treatment plant and the Otay treatment plant.

This will eventually boost fluoride content in local water to 0.9 milligrams per liter. Jim McVeigh of the Otay water plant says San Diego water already has a naturally occurring fluoride content of .37 milligrams.

Fluoridation will come as bad news to a boisterous minority in San Diego. Some members of the anti-fluoride crowd have posted comments on this blog referring to fluoride variously as a drug, a contaminant, and an industrial waste. Read their views yourself and draw your own conclusions.

I will only say I grew up in the Midwest with fluoridated water and I feel fine, thanks. The federal government is asking San Diego to dial down the fluoride to 0.7 milligrams per liter to better avoid the risk of dental fluorosis, which can give teeth a mottled appearance. It’s a recommendation from the Health and Human Services Department, not a requirement.

So fluoride has arrived, and I promise not to say anything about Dr. Strangelove.