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New research from Trinity College Dublin shows no link between exposure to community water fluoridation (CWF) and later-life cognitive function in older Irish adults. The research also found no evidence that exposure in early childhood had any impact either.

CWF was introduced in Ireland in 1964 as a public health measure to prevent tooth decay. It has proven effective at this, but in recent years there has been growing public debate about whether fluoride could have a negative effect on brain health and development.

The researchers used data from the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA) to calculate how much fluoride each of 2,495 older adults (average age 65) had likely consumed from drinking fluoridated water over their lifetime. They tracked where they had lived and matched this to national water fluoride concentration records going back many years, down to infancy in some people.

Participants were grouped by how much of their lives had been spent drinking fluoridated water, from low to high exposure, and were given two standard cognitive tests used in dementia research. Scores did not differ between any of the exposure groups, suggesting no link between CWF and cognition in older adults.

"Our findings provide reassurance that lifetime exposure to fluoridated drinking water at the levels used in Ireland is not associated with poorer cognitive function in older adults," said Dr. Vinay Sharma, from Trinity's School of Medicine, who is lead author of the study, just published in the Journal of Dental Research .

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