Naples, Florida, will no longer add fluoride to the city’s water after city council members on Wednesday voted 4-3 to end the practice. The vote followed a public hearing, during which at least a dozen people spoke on both sides of the issue, the Naples Daily News reported.

Members of the nonprofit advocacy group Stand for Health Freedom, along with other city residents petitioned the city in October to stop fluoridation, arguing that it is linked to lowered IQ in children, thyroid problems and other medical issues.

The council responded by asking the city attorney to prepare an amendment to the city ordinance that would allow the city to stop fluoridating its water. On Nov. 6, council members voted to send the proposed amendment out for public notification and debate.

After a public meeting this week, the council voted on the amendment and directed the city manager to halt water fluoridation on or before Jan. 1.

“Yesterday was a fun day in Naples,” resident and Stand for Health Freedom organizer Scott Kiley told The Defender in an interview on Thursday.

“God bless our four city councilors who were able to connect dots and process logically. Mayor Heitmann, Vice Mayor Hutchison, Councilor Bill Kramer, Councilor Berne Barton … God bless you for your courage and wisdom!!”

The Naples decision comes less than two weeks after Florida Surgeon General Joseph A. Ladapo advised governments across the state to stop adding fluoride to their water. Ladapo cited the neuropsychiatric risks — particularly for pregnant women and children — associated with the practice.

His office also issued written guidance detailing the latest research showing that exposure to fluoridated water can lead to neurodevelopmental issues in children, including lower IQ.

Given that risk, along with the wide availability of toothpaste, mouthwash and other alternative sources of fluoride, Ladapo recommended against community water fluoridation.

Ladapo said he revisited his position after a landmark ruling in September by a California federal judge prompted him to review the science.

In that ruling, U.S. District Judge Edward Chen concluded water fluoridation at current U.S. levels poses an “unreasonable risk” to children’s health. Chen ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to take regulatory action in light of recent scientific findings.

The ruling stemmed from a lawsuit filed in 2017 by Fluoride Action Network, Moms Against Fluoridation, Food & Water Watch and individual parents and children.

It also followed the publication in August of a key report by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ National Toxicology Program that concluded higher levels of fluoride exposure in drinking water are consistently linked to lower IQ in kids.

In October, an updated Cochrane Review concluded that adding fluoride to drinking water provides very limited, if any, dental benefits, especially compared with 50 years ago.

Mayor: ‘Why do we put fluoride in the water?’

Kiley, who is Stand for Health Freedom’s associate director of Local Advocacy, said the move to petition the city of Naples followed the success local citizens had in Collier County, where Naples is located.

Kiley and other Stand for Health Freedom organizers were instrumental in the county’s decision to adopt a countywide “health freedom bill of rights,” which then prompted them to raise the issue of water fluoridation as a violation of their rights.

The Collier County Commissioners voted in February to stop fluoridating the county’s water. When the group discovered that Naples, an incorporated town, had its own water supply with different rules, they brought their concerns to the city council, Kiley said.

Within a couple of months, the city decided to follow suit.

At this week’s meeting, dissenting council members asked that the vote be delayed and the issue further workshopped. However, Mayor Teresa Heitmann said she had been on the council since 2008 and the issue had been presented at least twice previously by Naples’ citizens. The process had been fair, she said.

She said that over the years she saw mounting evidence that forces the question of “Why do we put fluoride in the water?”

City council members did not respond to The Defender’s request for comment or declined to comment.

Over 60 towns now debating whether to stop fluoridating their water

Since the September court ruling many U.S. cities and towns have moved to pause or stop fluoridating their water, signaling that fluoridating water, a long-term and largely unquestioned practice in the U.S., is facing heightened scrutiny by the public.

Several other Florida towns have also recently ended water fluoridation.

Perry stopped fluoridating its water in August 2023. Winter Haven, where Ladapo held his press conference announcing his revised water fluoridation recommendations, voted to stop fluoridating its water in November. Brooksville voted to stop water fluoridation in April. And the city of Stuart decided last week to pause its water fluoridation practice.

The Tavares City Council is expected to vote on ending its water fluoridation practice at the Dec. 18 meeting.

“We applaud the local campaigners in Naples,” Stuart Cooper, executive director of the Fluoride Action Network, told The Defender.

He added:

“Citizens have been winning victory after victory to remove fluoridation chemicals from their water since the publication of the federal court ruling. Over 20 communities have ended fluoridation in recent weeks, including in Canada and New Zealand, and over 60 towns that we’re aware of are debating the topic right now. The time for citizens to act is now!”