Florida takes action to get the lead out of dental work
By Whitney Sessa
5/14/2008 © Florida Health News
Lead is so damaging to the body that it's been banned from house paint, gasoline and other products. Yet in recent months it has been found in children's jewelry, pet toys and even dental work -- all with some link to China.
Following reports in February of a contaminated dental bridge in Ohio, Florida legislators passed a bill requiring dental laboratories to disclose where a product originated and the materials it contains. The bill awaits Gov. Crist’s signature.
When it passed the disclosure requirement on the final day of the legislative session May 2, Florida became the first state to act on the Ohio reports, said Rep. Stan Jordan, R-Jacksonville.
“If I were a dentist, I would want that added measure of protection,” said Jordan, the bill’s sponsor. “You need to be able to trace it back.” Patients can also request the information, which is to be kept in their records, he said.
Other provisions in the bill allow dentists who hold licenses from other states to practice in Florida in areas where they are needed, and require some training before opening a dental laboratory. Before, anyone could legally open a lab by just getting a business license, said Jordan. “We could open one out of the trunk of our car,” he said.
The dental bill has been in the works since 2006, but the industry did not support it at first because it called for every lab to have a certified dental technician. The Florida Dental Association believed that was unnecessary and would eventually cause smaller dental labs to go out of business, said Nolan W. Allen, the group’s president. When that requirement was dropped, the association became a co-sponsor.
“I was really proud to stand up and say that Florida was the first in the nation to pass point-of-origin and material-content disclosure,” Allen said.
Dental laboratory disclosure has been an issue for years, said Bennett Napier, executive director of the National Association of Dental Laboratories, another group that supported the bill. The issue heated up in February, when WBNS-10TV in Ohio reported that a Ravenna woman suffered long-term pain and jaw damage from a dental bridge made of materials from China that contained unsafe levels of lead.
Loopholes in federal and state laws allowed U.S. dental labs to send work overseas where production costs are cheaper, often without the knowledge of the dentists and patients, 10TV reported. The station ordered eight crowns from Chinese dental labs and found one contained lead.
The disclosure act is a good idea, said Alex Cardounel, a dentist in Plantation, Fla. He said he has been doing business with the same dental laboratory in Fort Lauderdale for about 20 years, one that provides a decal that lists the composition of all the metals used in the products. When dentists send work to China, Cardounel said, “how are you supposed to know what you are getting back?"
Assuming the governor signs it, the law will go into effect Jan. 1, 2009.
