Louisiana bill that would ban fluoride in public drinking water passes Senate committee

BATON ROUGE, La. (Louisiana First) — A bill that would prohibit the addition of fluoride to public drinking water in Louisiana was approved in the Senate Committee on Health and Welfare Wednesday.

Senate Bill 2, sponsored by Sen. Mike Fesi (R-Houma), would repeal the Louisiana Department of Health’s water fluoridation program and explicitly ban the fluoridation of any public water system in the state. Amendments to the bill in committee added that no naturally occurring fluoride in water systems would be required to be removed, and the date the bill would become law was changed to Jan. 1, 2026.

Louisiana Surgeon General Ralph Abraham told lawmakers there have been studies that show a link between fluoride and lower IQs in children. A report last year from the federal National Toxicology Program noted a potential connection between fluoride and lower IQ scores in children, but emphasized that the findings primarily applied to regions with much higher levels of natural fluoride than found in U.S. water systems.

“We are putting a chemical in the water without the patient’s consent is problematic for me as a physician,” Abraham said.

The American Dental Association (ADA) said in an April 7 release that fluoridation is a proven, cost-effective tool that reduces dental decay, especially in children and low-income communities.

On the national level, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is pushing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to stop recommending water fluoridation. Kennedy, who has called fluoride a “dangerous neurotoxin,” recently announced that he is forming a task force to study fluoridation and provide new guidance.

If passed, Louisiana’s bill would make it the second state in the nation to ban fluoridation at the state level. Utah, the first state to enact the ban, got praise from Kennedy for being a leader in the “Make America Healthy Again” initiative.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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