Texas Lawyer Basic Ken Paxton is investigating two main toothpaste makers over their use of fluoride, suggesting that they’re “illegally advertising and marketing” the enamel cleaners to oldsters and children “in methods which might be deceptive, misleading, and harmful.”

The toothpaste makers within the crosshairs are Colgate-Palmolive Firm, maker of Colgate toothpastes, and Proctor & Gamble Manufacturing Co., which makes Crest toothpastes. In an announcement Thursday, Paxton stated he has despatched Civil Investigative Calls for (CIDs) to the businesses.

The transfer is an escalation in an ongoing battle over fluoride, which successfully prevents dental cavities and improves oral well being. Group water fluoridation has been hailed by well being and dental consultants as one of the top 10 great public health interventions for advancing oral well being throughout communities, no matter age, schooling, or revenue. However, regardless of the success, fluoride has all the time had detractors—from conspiracy theorists previously suggesting the naturally occurring mineral is a type of communist thoughts management, to more moderen instances, wherein low-quality, controversial research have instructed that prime doses might decrease IQ in youngsters.

The talk was renewed earlier this 12 months when the Nationwide Toxicology Program on the Nationwide Institute of Environmental Well being Sciences finally published a particularly contentious study after years of failed scientific reviews. The examine claims to discover a hyperlink between excessive ranges of fluoride publicity and barely decrease IQs in youngsters dwelling in areas exterior the US, largely in China and India. However the examine’s methodology, statistical rigor, threat of bias, and lack of knowledge transparency proceed to attract criticism.