Medical Questions » Teeth Questions » Question No. 984
| Question: | My son obtains his water for drinking from an underground well. Do his children need to take fluoride tablets? |
| Answer: | Some water supplies, be they from the local dam or an underground well, contain adequate amounts of fluoride to protect children' s teeth. The fact that children in some communities were noticed to have far healthier teeth than others, led to the discovery of fluoride in the water supply of the healthier children, and the subsequent development of fluoridation of many water supplies around the world to protect the teeth of children.
Your local council can tell you if your water supply contains adequate amounts of fluoride. If it does not, your children should take fluoride tablets or drops to protect their teeth from premature decay.
When using water from a well, it will be necessary to have a sample of the water analysed to determine its fluoride content. Industrial chemists undertake this work, and it is important to obtain these results, as giving fluoride supplements to children who already have adequate fluoride in their diets can lead to teeth discolouration (but not damage). The minerals in the ground around the well will determine the amount of fluoride in the water.
Water obtained from rooftops and tanks will never contain any fluoride, as this is very close to distilled water, which contains no minerals of any sort.
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