I AGREE with the letter “Don’t Force fluoride” (Letters, May 8) as I too am concerned to read that Southampton’s Labour leader has voted twice in favour of fluoridation and suggests a referendum.

If even one person does not want to drink this chemical, no matter what anybody else wants, then it is not acceptable to force him to do so. There are very few illnesses where a doctor can insist a patient must have treatment forced upon him.

In a referendum, great care would need to be taken to ask an unbiased question.

Sometimes in the past a biased question was asked in surveys, such as “If fluroride could help children’s teeth would you be in favour?” The question would need to be a neutral – “Do you want fluoride to be added to your tap water supply?

Tick ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.”

However, the idea of adding a chemical to tap water to bring about changes in the human body is just not ethical.

Painting a fluoride gel on a child’s teeth has been proven to be much more effective than fluoridating the whole water supply. Fluoridation is wasteful, expensive, out-of-date and ineffective.

The countries with the biggest fall in tooth decay are Denmark, Finland, Holland and Sweden – not of which are fluoridated!

A WILLS, Address supplied.