By TANIA PHILLIPS
FLUORIDATION is back in the spotlight in the Granite Belt after a petition against putting fluoride in town water was presented to the Southern Downs Regional Council last week in Stanthorpe.
Mary Rofe of the Save Our Shire Action Group said the petition, with more than 400 names, was collected over a three-month period last year.
She said the majority of the signatures were collected at the group’s shopfront in Stanthorpe.
“The jury is still out on fluoridated water,” claimed Ms Rofe.
“This is a significant indication that people are not happy with the compulsory fluoridisation of their town water.”
Ms Rofe supporters packed the council meeting room last Thursday to witness the SOSAG presentation and back objections to mass fluoride medication.
Concerns were voiced for different reasons. One mother has children who are severely allergic to all additives to natural water, others opposed fluoridation on medical grounds – believing it to be harmful to their health and actually counter-productive to long-term dental health.
Deputy Mayor Ross Bartley said the petition was the first real indication the council had seen that the community did not want fluoridation.
“It is the first feedback we’ve had on how the community felt about it,” he said. “It is the first real representation that I have seen in my time in this and the past council.
“I imagine it will now be the subject of a report and further discussion and then a decision will be made one way or the other.”
Ms Rofe said the State Government had given each council the option to fluoridate or not. She said the group hoped the council would “change its mind” on fluoridation.
