Fluoride + Communism = Mind Control?
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In 1999, the CDC listed fluoridated drinking water as one of the 10 greatest public health achievements of the 20th century. The list also included access to family planning and contraceptive services and the recognition of tobacco as a public health hazard.

At the time, an estimated 144 million Americans had access to water with added fluoride, a feat credited with improving oral health across the socioeconomic spectrum. And as you probably know, because your dentist has told you,

Oral health plays a major role in overall health, helping our bodies fight infections and prevent complications like heart disease, pneumonia, clogged arteries, and stroke. But recently, the tides of public opinion have shifted.

In May 2025, Utah became the first state to ban fluoride in public drinking water. The move happened amidst an ongoing debate questioning whether its health benefits outweigh its potential risks. One of the biggest faces of that fight has been Robert F. Kennedy Jr., now the 26th Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

and a nephew of the man we've probably spent the most amount of time talking about on this show. But before we drill too deep into the current discourse, we want to go back to its roots. See, controversy and fluoride have long gone hand in hand. Since the very first push for fluoride to be added to our drinking water, there have been people biting back.

And every step of the way, conspiracy theories have been there, shaping the narrative, bearing their fangs, and chipping away at public trust. So, brace yourself and open wide for the strange history and latest wisdom around fluoride and your teeth.

Welcome to Conspiracy Theories, a Spotify podcast. I'm Carter Roy. You can find us here every Wednesday. Be sure to check us out on Instagram at theconspiracypod, and we would love to hear from you. So if you're listening on the Spotify app, swipe up and give us your thoughts. Stay with us.

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Ever wonder what really happened behind the world's darkest crimes, twisted cults, and chilling conspiracies? I'm Chris Collins, and on my podcast, Crime, Conspiracy, Cults, and Murder, we bust through the windshield and dive headfirst deep into the cases that keep you up at night.

From unsolved murders to secret societies and everything in between. I have new episodes every single week with real stories, no fluff, just the cold, hard truth. So grab your blankie and a flashlight and listen to Crime, Conspiracy, Cults, and Murder on Spotify. So why does most of the United States add fluoride to its drinking water? Let's go back to the beginning.

In 1901, a young dentist opens a practice in Colorado Springs, Colorado. His name is Dr. Frederick McKay. And McKay quickly notices something unusual about his patient's teeth. Many have permanent splotchy stains covering their enamel. This comes as a surprise to McKay, who's new to the area, but he learns it's old hat for the locals. They already have a name for it.

They call it Colorado Brown Stain. Today, we call it dental fluorosis. McKay goes on the hunt for answers, and with the help of another dentist, Dr. G.V. Black, learns that dental fluorosis, though not aesthetically pleasing, comes with some benefits. It seems to make teeth more resistant to cavities and decay.

He also learns the stain isn't regionally unique. He eventually finds other outbreaks in communities across the country, including the small town of Oakley, Idaho. In 1923, McKay travels to Oakley and speaks to parents who say their kid's stains appeared after their town switched its water supply. On McKay's suggestion...

The town reverts back to their old water source, and within a few years, the stain's prevalence dies down. The change reinforces a theory that water is somehow connected to fluorosis, but McKay doesn't know how.

until he travels with another colleague to the site of a third outbreak in Bauxite, Arkansas. There, McKay begins testing the local water supply, and his research unwittingly places him in the political fray.

Boxsite is a company town owned by the Aluminum Company of America, and locals have been raising alarms about its cookware factories located near their homes. Some believe aluminum is poisonous and are worried about the potential effects their proximity could have on their health. And this discourse ultimately works in McKay's favor.

Having a stake in tamping down public fears, the aluminum company's chief chemist, a man named H.V. Churchill, runs his own tests on the town's water. And because Churchill has access to more sophisticated technology, he finds what McKay wasn't able to. The water is contaminated, not with aluminum or chemicals, but with a lot of chemicals.

but with high levels of fluoride. Churchill sends his results to McKay, who then collects samples from other communities and eventually reaches a conclusion. Dental fluorosis is caused by high levels of fluoride. In the 1930s, the head of the dental hygiene unit at the National Institutes of Health, Dr. H. Trenley Dean, takes McKay's research and runs with it.

He tests a theory that lower concentrations of fluoride might be able to strengthen enamel without causing unwanted discoloration. And he eventually lands on what he considers an ideal ratio. One milligram of fluoride to every liter of water. Picture one million equal-sized balls filling up a swimming pool. Now, throw one more ball in. Oh, that.

That last ball is Dean's recommended fluoride dose. Now, the results aren't 100% perfect. Even at that ratio, Dean finds that a small percentage of especially sensitive people will likely still experience mild fluorosis. In his opinion, the overall results would be worth it, but to really prove his claim,

He needs to take his theory to the next level by testing it out on humans. In 1944, Dean gets his first opportunity. The City Commission of Grand Rapids, Michigan votes to add fluoride to their drinking water. The study tracks the oral health of 30,000 school-aged kids.

It's meant to last 15 years, but officials declare the program a success four years early. In that time, they see a 60% drop in cavities and tooth decay.

Before the study is completed, more American cities adopt their own programs. And soon, the practice spreads like wildfire. By 1954, more than 20 million Americans receive artificially fluoridated tap water. Two years later, Crest releases its first fluoride toothpaste. Seven years after that, the U.S. federal government publishes its first how-to manual.

Flash forward to 2010 and a plaque gets erected in Grand Rapids, Michigan, celebrating the very first

fluoridation plant. As of 2022, CDC data indicates that about 209 million people, or nearly three quarters of the United States population, receives water through publicly fluoridated systems. Which brings us to another question. What is fluoride? Well, it isn't one thing, it's many.

Fluorine, with an I-N-E, is a highly unstable toxic gas at room temperature. Because it's so unstable, fluorine rarely appears in nature in its pure form. It generally wants to bond with other elements like sodium or calcium to form a binary compound and become more stable. You'll hear people call any compound that has fluorine in it a fluoride.

regardless of its specific chemical bonds. Sodium fluoride, calcium fluoride, doesn't really matter. It can get shorthanded to fluoride. But it's important to note, not all fluorides are the same. When people talk about fluoridating water today, they're talking about one of three compounds. Fluorosilic acid, sodium fluorosilicate, and sodium fluoride.

Of those, sodium fluoride was the first ever put into practice, and it's still an ingredient today. But years before it helped protect our teeth, sodium fluoride was used for another purpose altogether, as a pesticide.

In 1942, three years before Grand Rapids, Michigan would become the first town in the United States to artificially fluoridate its drinking water, tragedy strikes a state hospital in Oregon. On the evening of November 18th,

467 patients and employees fall suddenly ill. The symptoms begin within five minutes of their nightly meal. Vomiting, blue lips, severe cramps in their legs and stomachs. Some are unable to stand and are forced to crawl on the hospital floor. Others vomit blood. Local doctors rush to the hospital to try and help, but there's only so much they can do.

the building's morgue is only meant to hold two to three bodies at a time and by morning 40 people are dead eventually that number climbs to 47. officials consider the possibility of mass murder or intentional sabotage somehow tied to the war overseas but an investigation reveals a much less sinister cause

a kitchen-related accident. The hospital was short-staffed and underfunded. That night, one of the cooks sent a patient to the basement to grab ingredients for dinner. The patient returned with what they thought was powdered milk for that night's scrambled eggs, but what was actually cockroach poison.

The cooks mixed the white powder into the food without a second thought. They didn't realize their mistake until after people started getting ill. Autopsies determined that the deaths were caused by ingesting large amounts of sodium fluoride, which looks like white powder. In some cases, the deceased had reportedly eaten more sodium fluoride than eggs.

And research suggests that just five grams of the compound can prove fatal to humans. For perspective, that's the same weight as a single U.S. nickel. Now, sodium fluoride hasn't just been used as an insect pesticide. It's historically been added to rat poisons as well. But context matters. In this case, nitrogen.

dosage matters. Chlorine is also toxic, but we still put it in our pools. Morphine can be incredibly deadly, but we use it to manage pain. Even certain vitamins are toxic in large doses. Hell, drinking too much water with or without fluoride in it can send you to an early grave. Yes, what happened at that Oregon State Hospital is a tragedy, but how many other mass fluoride poisonings come to mind still?

At a time when the whole system was in its infancy, can you blame someone for questioning whether it's beneficial to add a known rat poison to public drinking water?

Take Alexander Wallace, for example. In 1949, Wallace is a local poet and a bit of a rabble rouser. And his rabble rousing turns him into one of the earliest leaders of the anti-fluoride movement. 1949 is four years after the first fluoridated water program in Grand Rapids. The concept is still novel for most Americans.

And Wallace learns that his hometown of Stevens Point, Wisconsin, plans to follow suit. From the jump, Wallace is completely against the idea because, in his mind, fluoride is a poison. And as we mentioned, he's technically not wrong.

even if his threat assessment is considerably off-base. To try to prevent an artificial fluoridation program in Stevens Point, Wallace creates a petition and successfully collects 1,300 signatures. That brings the issue of fluoridated water to a referendum, forcing city officials to put it on the ballot in September 1950. In the lead-up to the vote, Wallace writes songs and hands out anti-fluoride literature to try to shape public sentiment,

And in the end, one of his arguments that people shouldn't blindly trust the government is made for him. Before September arrives, he finds out that city officials had already started fluoridating the water before a vote could even take place.

Wallace makes a shocking announcement at one of his rallies, and the public backlash is swift. Even though officials reverse course, come September, residents overwhelmingly vote to reject fluoride in their water. It's the first major defeat of its kind in the United States, and it gives way to more opposition. And...

Conspiracy theories. The beginning of experimental fluoridation programs coincides with a politically tumultuous chapter of American history. The tail end of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War. Conspiracy theories about communist spies infiltrating American institutions run rampant, peddled on a national level by Wisconsin Senator

Joseph McCarthy. And fluoride's implementation gets inextricably wrapped up in America's second red scare. Out of this sea of paranoia and fear, a group called the John Birch Society forms, founded by retired candy magnate Robert H.W. Welch Jr.,

The John Birch Society echoes McCarthy's claims and takes them one step further. Welch suggests that secret societies like the Illuminati and Freemasons are somehow wrapped up in a communist agenda.

He even claims Soviet agents have already infiltrated American schools and churches. In the case of fluoride, the John Birch Society argues that it's a communist tool. Now, the group doesn't really get into specifics around how that works, but their logic follows the slippery slope argument.

Allowing the government to make decisions that impact public health without the public's consent sets a dangerous precedent, one that inevitably leads to less personal agency and more government control. They essentially draw a straight line from artificial fluoridation to a full-blown communist takeover. Though many in the anti-fluoride movement remain skeptical of Welch's more fringe beliefs—

More and more groups echo the Birch Society's position on fluoride, among them the Ku Klux Klan and the Citizens Medical Reference Bureau. But at some point, the alleged threat of fluoridated water becomes much less ideological and much more literal. Eventually, an allegation is made that the Nazi Party used fluoride experimentation to make populations easier.

You might hear sources trace this claim back to 1954 and a chemist and author named Charles Perkins. He supposedly wrote about fluoride as mind control in a piece that included the following excerpt.

In his writing, Perkins allegedly said that Nazis experimented with fluoride on Jewish populations during the Holocaust.

and that the Russians used it on their own prisoners of war. On their face, the accusations are damning. The question is, are they true? In short, almost certainly not. Perkins never provided any evidence to support his claims, and no evidence has materialized since.

Of course, we now know the Nazis conducted all kinds of shocking and inhumane experiments on humans, some related to mind control. The United States and the CIA did as well, through a secret program called MKUltra. You may have heard of it, we've covered it extensively on this show. But with respect to fluoride...

A spokesperson from the US Holocaust Museum says there is no reason to believe it was ever used in Nazi experiments.

Even chemists from high-profile anti-fluoridation organizations like the Fluoride Action Network agree that historical evidence is extremely weak. They say unfounded conspiracy theories only serve to weaken what is, in their view, a legitimate case against artificially fluoridating drinking water. Moreover,

the man who supposedly invented the Nazi mind control theory, Charles Perkins, it's possible he never actually existed. Research by the Poyntner Institute suggests Perkins might have been invented by a self-published author in the 1990s

as a way to support their anti-fluoride claims. In that case, Nazi mind control conspiracy theories didn't enter the public arena until well after fluoride's mass implementation in the States. But other similar theories spread early on, like that fluoride produces so-called moronic atheistic slaves, or that it turns women into nymphomaniacs.

or that it was actually a weapon in a plot to, quote, weaken the Aryan race by paralyzing the functions of the frontal lobe. The list of supposed side effects grows even longer as more Americans gain access. Some claim it causes anxiety and memory loss.

Perhaps most notable are its alleged links to cancer. Those date back to at least 1950, when an experiment out of the University of Texas preliminarily finds...

mice that drink fluoridated water develop cancer earlier than those who don't. The news leaks to the press before any official conclusions are drawn, but by that point, the damage is mostly done. Even after the scientists learned they had messed up and accidentally fed all of the mice in their experiment, including the ones in their control group, food that contained large amounts of fluoride,

The invalidated Texas study is cited by anti-fluoride groups for decades to come. But ultimately, the anti-fluoride movement never quite reaches a fever pitch. By the time the Red Scare passes and Senator McCarthy has been impeached for his fraudulent communist witch hunt...

Anti-fluoride sentiment enters the social fringe. In 1964, Stanley Kubrick's film Dr. Strangelove pokes fun at fluoride conspiracies. In one memorable scene, the character of General Ripper delivers a fervent monologue saying, quote,

Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous communist plot we have ever had to face? The moment is included as a punchline, meant to elicit ridicule, indicative of the changing tides of public opinion. But even as fluoride conspiracy theories fade into the background, they never go away entirely.

Their popularity ebbs and flows, and now in 2025, fluoride has re-entered the spotlight. And this time, its potential harms are being taken seriously by a more mainstream audience.

When it comes to fluoridating water, the line between concern and conspiracy can feel blurred. By definition, conspiracies involve secret plans to knowingly break the law or cause harm. And by that measure, there's only one more left for us to discuss. That, despite its potential health risks, fluoride is added to water in part as a money-making scheme.

The Fluoride Action Network's website includes an article called Following the Money, published in December 2013. And it is true. There is money to be made in fluoride. Let's start with those outside of the fluoride industry whose profits are more indirect, like the historic Sugar Research Foundation.

Back in 1949, they were a coalition of sugar manufacturers based in the United States. One of their stated goals was to, quote, find how tooth decay may be controlled effectively without restriction whatsoever.

of sugar intake. In his book, The Case Against Fluoride, chemist and anti-fluoride activist Paul Connett claimed that sugar lobbies paid considerable sums of money to fluoride research that year.

The money may have incentivized researchers to minimize fluoride's potential health risks. It makes sense why sugar companies would have wanted people to have stronger teeth so people would feel comfortable buying more candy, regardless of the cost. The thing is, there's been countless more research studies since 1949, and all those separate and often independent studies have, for the most part,

drawn the same conclusion. Fluoride's benefits outweigh its potential harm. But let's look at who's directly profiting off of water fluoridation programs today. Of course, there are those companies that make and sell fluoride on purpose. There are also those that accidentally create it as a byproduct of their other industrial manufacturing processes. They then sell what would otherwise be waste to turn a profit.

It's a practice that dates back to the earliest days of fluoridated water and the Aluminum Company of America. You might remember them and their lead chemist, Dr. H.V. Churchill. Separate from direct sales, some, but not all, states receive federal funding from the CDC to support community fluoridated water programs.

In theory, that practice could incentivize community leaders to use fluoride so that access to those funds aren't cut off, especially if no one's really tracking how the funds are spent. So how much money is there to be made in fluoridated water? Estimates suggest it costs about $1 per person per year to fluoridate water.

In the United States, there were about 209 million people with public access in 2022. If we took those estimates and made a direct cost-to-person conversion, that would suggest the cost of the U.S. fluoridated water industry is somewhere around $209 million a year. Even if the actual figure is millions of dollars higher, it's not a big deal.

As far as public health initiatives go, that is incredibly inexpensive. And the return on investment is reportedly very high. Studies estimate that for every $1 spent, the average American saves about $20 to $50 or more in dental costs every year. If you want to look where the real money is made in fluoride, it's not in community water programs.

It's in infused dental hygiene products sold by private companies. That's a multi-billion dollar industry, one that is separate and almost entirely unrelated to public water. Now, opposition groups like the Fluoride Action Network have argued that dentists and dental companies lobby to support inaccurate research studies promoting fluoride and its benefits.

But that argument is antithetical to the existing research that shows fluoridating water leads to Americans spending less money on their teeth, less money for those companies. In fact, when government officials have made statements about reducing or eliminating fluoride from public drinking water, the stocks for dental companies have gone up, presumably in anticipation of people spending more money on dental products and procedures.

And case studies support that cause-and-effect logic. The city of Juneau, Alaska, removed fluoride from their drinking water in 2007. And a 2018 study showed an almost 50% increase in the amount of dental procedures people needed. Calgary, Canada, removed fluoride from their water in 2011. Then in 2018, the city voted to add it back in after seeing the need for child dental care grow.

And it's worth mentioning that research suggests limiting access to fluoridated water impacts low-income communities the most. In 2011, the United States drops recommended levels of fluoride from 1 milligram to 0.7 milligrams per liter of water. The Department of Health and Human Services says the update is meant to minimize the risk of dental fluorosis while still protecting teeth.

They saw an uptick in the prevalence and severity of fluorosis and decided to scale back. They also pointed out that more and more people had access to other sources of fluoride,

like toothpastes and mouthwash. But in 2025, there are those who claim the compound should be removed from public drinking water entirely. In April, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said he planned to tell the CDC to stop recommending fluoride in U.S. drinking water. He's called fluoride, quote,

and industrial waste associated with arthritis, bone fractures, bone cancer, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental disorders, and thyroid disease. Now, there are elements of truth in that statement, as we discussed.

Fluoride can be created as a byproduct of industrial manufacturing processes. But calling it industrial waste ignores the fact that fluoride is a naturally occurring mineral compound that appears in water, soil, and food all over the world without any human intervention. H2O is often a byproduct of industrial manufacturing processes.

but that doesn't make water industrial waste. The most attention-grabbing news related to fluoridated water recently revolves around its potential impact on children's IQ. A review of aggregated studies conducted by the U.S. National Toxicology Program concluded with, quote,

Moderate confidence that drinking water with elevated levels of fluoride could lower children's IQs by two to five points. That has understandably raised alarm bells for some who claim that fluoridated water is making our kids less intelligent. But IQ tests only measure certain cognitive abilities and aren't a direct measure of intelligence. Socioeconomic factors can play a role, and none of the studies actually measured how

or if fluoride changes the brain on a biological level. It's important to note, not all studies the NTP looked at showed an impact on IQ. Some showed no drop at all. And those that did only saw changes in IQ when children were consuming fluoride in excess levels.

In many cases, more than double what's recommended. Moreover, as the New York Times put it, naturally occurring fluoride seems almost entirely to blame for those especially high levels. In other words, drops in IQ seem to be mostly, if not entirely, unrelated to government programs.

It was happening in places where fluoride entered water sources through runoff from rocks and soil, like in the cases of private wells that aren't closely monitored. Our friends over at Science Versus tackled the subject of fluoride back in April 2025. Their team dug through the research, read a bunch of papers, and spoke with a lot of experts,

including an epidemiologist, a professor of community health sciences, and a long list of researchers. One of their biggest takeaways from the health debate was,

we should be investing in more research. Science is a moving target, and the more information and data we collect, the closer to the truth we get and the more accurate our recommendations can be. There's plenty of research that says fluoride is good for your teeth. That's not really in question. The American Dental Association supports fluoridated water.

They see the benefits to their patients' teeth and follow the existing research. But we could have more and better research about its potential harms. At currently recommended levels, the science still says that the biggest health risk fluoridated water poses is the same as it's always been.

dental fluorosis. And that's hardly life-threatening. It's when fluoride consumption moves beyond recommended levels that things get trickier and health risks go up. And while we should keep investigating those risks, we've always been aware of that fact. Like we said, dosage matters. Maybe you're a pregnant woman who wants to be extra cautious

Maybe you're a black tea lover and think you get plenty of fluoride from the natural fluorides they often provide. Whatever the case, if you live in the United States, you should know state and local municipalities run your public water systems, not the federal government.

And if you're concerned about your personal intake, you can check your local fluoride levels on the CDC's My Waters Fluoride page. We'll drop a link in the episode description. If you happen to find you live somewhere with higher than recommended levels, don't worry. You have options outside of permanently switching to bottled water. There are relatively inexpensive home purifiers that can remove all the fluoride from your tap water.

If you're interested in a more expansive picture of where the science of fluoride is right now, we highly recommend checking out Science Vs. Coverage.

If you're interested in the current political debate over fluoride, our friends over at The Journal have their own episode about that. As for conspiracy theories, our specialty, we can confidently say that big fluoride isn't out to cause you harm. And it's your dentist, not communists, who want it in your water.

Thank you for watching Conspiracy Theories. We're here with a new episode every Wednesday. Be sure to check us out on Instagram at TheConspiracyPod. And if you're watching on Spotify, swipe up and give us your thoughts.

For more information on the history of fluoride conspiracies, we recommend checking out the 1985 Wilson Quarterly article, America's Longest War, The Fight Over Fluoridation by Donald McNeil. Among the many sources we used for this episode, we found it extremely helpful to our research. Until next time, remember, the truth isn't always the best story and the official story isn't always the truth.

This episode was written and researched by Connor Sampson, edited by Maggie Admire, fact-checked by Laurie Siegel, engineered by Sam Amezcua, and video edited and sound designed by Ryan Contra. I'm your host, Carter Roy.