Hello!

Pete Evans is no stranger to trouble and has once again landed himself in hot water for actively supporting a new controversial study.

Results of a study published in a US medical journey concluded that pregnant women who drank water that contained fluoride gave birth to babies with a lower IQ.

Celebrity Chef Pete Evans came out in full support of the research telling the Herald Sun: “This has been known for ages, and this is just the tip of that iceberg.”

Fluoride Is Toxic

He continued: “Fluoride is a known neurotoxin and it should not be put in our water supply.”

“If people choose to add fluoride then it should be their choice to do so. I cannot wait for it to be eliminated from being added to Australian water supplies.”

Experts were quick to refute the claims made in the JAMA Pediatrics publication.

No Evidence!

Associate Professor Matt Hopcraft, the chief executive of the Australian Dental Association Victorian Branch was derisive about the chef’s support of the claims. He spoke to news.com.au saying:
“I think we should take public health advice from the experts and he should probably stick to the celebrity cheffing and leave public health policy to the experts.”

“Of course Pete is going to jump on board and say this is the silver bullet — as a lot of anti-fluoridationists will — but overwhelmingly there’s no evidence to link water fluoridation with health concerns.”

What The Study Said

The study involved 601 Canadian children from six major cities born between 2008 and 2012. 41 per cent of those involved in the study lived in communities supplied with fluoridated water.

Analysed data discovered maternal exposure to higher levels of fluoride during pregnancy was associated with lower IQ scores in children aged three to four years old.

“These findings indicate the possible need to reduce fluoride intake during pregnancy,” the researchers concluded.

Questions?

However many experts are questioning the study methods and the concluding results.

“I find it hard to take Pete Evan’s opinion seriously when he isn’t a dentist who has seen kids with rotten teeth in the non-fluoridated towns compared to the happy, healthy kids in fluoridated areas,” Dr Kristina Cain, of Queensland’s Refresh Dental Spa told news.com.au.

“Dentists have a moral and ethical obligation to the community and its health and are effectively putting ourselves out of business by advocating water fluoridation. That has to stand for something.”

Dr Michael Foley, spokesman for the Australian Dental Association, said anything was toxic if you had enough of it – water, oxygen, calcium, iron, salt and even caffeine.

“Does this mean we shouldn’t drink coffee? Of course not,” he said.

Support

There were, however, a few who defended Chef Evan’s viewpoint:

Dr Mark Diesendorf, an honorary associate professor in the environmental humanities group at Sydney’s University of NSW said:

“I’m opposed to fluoridation also, I must admit, but I wouldn’t come to that conclusion (to remove fluoride from water) on the present study alone,” he said.

“There’s a lot of other related studies that are entirely consistent with this, in the way of developmental neurological effects.

“I would argue pregnant women and also women feeding with formula should not use fluoridated water. There’s enough to be worried. We are now at a stage where this is something of concern.”

Most recently, Pete Evans hit headlines admitting he’d rather his kids ‘have cannabis’ than drink alcohol when they’re of age.

Do you believe Pete has a point? Tell us in your comments below.

More On Mouths of Mums

We may get commissions for purchases made using links in this post. Learn more.
  • Well back in the day everyone in my area drank the tap water so there would have been an entire suburb of low QI babies and Im one of them.

    Reply

  • He’s so stupid.
    Seriously, he’s just a chef! When he made the paleo diet take off I rolled my eyes – again, he is a chef not a nutritionist!!! All those people who followed his diet are just s brainless. Sorry not sorry!!!!!!!!

    Reply

  • I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous.

    Reply

  • He thinks he is more educated than what he is, leave it to the experts Pete

    Reply

  • why do people keep giving him airtime? He is an idiot

    Reply

  • Ummmm scientific reason please???

    Reply

  • I don’t think Pete has a lot of common sense.

    Reply

  • Presumably his mum drnk a lot of fluoridated water while pregnant with him, then.

    Reply

  • Seriously! We live an an area with flouridated water and my siblings are all high IQ achievers. We were all invited to attend a selective high school. Al most all of my primary school class graduated from UNi and several became MD or gained a PhD. I think there were other mitigating factors in that study. Conspiracy theories abound that govts want to keep their citizens down by using fluoride. Craziness. No lack of iodine etc, another story.

    Reply

  • hmmm it’s interesting

    Reply

  • Hmmmmm, I’m not sure. And even it was proven to be true, fluoride is added for dental health benefits. So we possibly have lower IQ humans with healthy teeth, or smarter humans with shocking teeth.

    Reply

  • There is always someone out there trying to scare the S*** out of pregnant women for doing “normal” things like drinking water. If that were the case we’d have a lot of low IQ kids in this country.

    Reply

  • I thought Tooth decay had decreased since fluoride has been added to water so it’s not all bad! As the closing comment states, more research before making big changes!

    Reply

  • I have always wondered whether fluoride in our water etc is doing us more harm than good, but I haven’t sat down and researched it myself, yet. As soon as I am able to get a filter for my tap I’ll be using the tank water for drinking. Looking forward to seeing the difference.

    Reply

  • Pete in hot water again. Everyone has there own beliefs. We can educate ourselves on what is good and bad. At the end of the day, its up to ourselves what we put inside out bodies

    Reply

Post a comment
Add a photo
Your MoM account


Lost your password?

Enter your email and a password below to post your comment and join MoM:

You May Like

Loading…

Looks like this may be blocked by your browser or content filtering.

↥ Back to top

Thanks For Your Star Rating!

Would you like to add a written rating or just a star rating?

Write A Rating Just A Star Rating
Join