LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: For most Australians, fluoride in drinking water means one thing - better teeth. But for many Queenslanders, the fluoridation of the water supply is something to be feared.

Under pressure from anti-fluoride groups, the mandatory fluoridation introduced by the former Labor Government is being rolled back by local councils, one by one. Much to the dismay of health authorities.

Matt Wordsworth reports.

MATT WORDSWORTH, REPORTER: It's Monday night in charters towers in North Queensland. And Merilyn Haynes has flown in from Brisbane to address the local council.

COUNCILLOR: I look forward to listening to all views this evening.

MATT WORDSWORTH: She's an anti-fluoride lobbyist and has travelled about 1400 kilometres to convince the councillors to dump water fluoridation.

MERILYN HAYNES, QUEENSLANDERS FOR SAFE WATER: And it says, used as a schedule six poison, uses: as an insecticide, particularly for roaches and ant, you know blah blah blah. Steel degassing agent, electro plating fluoridation of drinking water. So you can use it either for killing insects or fluoridation of drinking water.

MATT WORDSWORTH: The debate may be decades called, for the rest of the country, but Queensland has long resisted fluoride, and opposition is growing.

(EXTRACT FROM VARIOUS COUNCIL MEETINGS)

WOMAN: Please take it out, it's killing earth and the rest of us.

MAN: It's a toxic by product that cost manufactures a lot of money to dispose of so instead we want to have it our water for to us drink it.?

MATT WORDSWORTH: A matter of weeks, nine councils around Queensland have abandoned the public health measure, from Australia's 14th largest city, Cairns, in the far north, to north-western centre of Cloncurry and south to the Wide Bay. Together they represent almost half a million people. The battle ground is now on Brisbane's doorstep.

ALLAN SUTHERLAND, MAYOR, MORETON BAY REGIONAL COUNCIL: Thank you.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Allan Sutherland is the mayor of Moreton Bay Regional Council. A commuter and retiree community of almost 400,000 people on Brisbane's northern outskirts.

ALLAN SUTHERLAND: I think it's fair to say most councillors would be in favour of taking fluoride out of the water supply. If the opportunity arose and if it could be con cost effectively.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Councillor James Houghton believes it's mass medication without consent, with potentially harmful effects. And is pushing the no case ahead of a vote expected next month.

JAMES HOUGHTON, COUNCILLOR, MORETON BAY REGIONAL COUNCIL: Galileo was proven right even though he said he was wrong. Columbus was proven right when others said he was wrong. When I was younger they used to spray us with DDT. Spray us! That's been proven wrong. So science is - makes themselves, provided there's proper research done, they will come up and prove previous reports wrong, so I've adopted an old adage, when in doubt anyway, leave out. When in doubt, leave out.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Until 2008, Townsville was the only place in Queensland with fluoridated water. Then premier Anna Bligh changed all that, announcing a mandatory roll-out that would take until the end of 2012. But after Campbell Newman came to power, he abandoned the mandatory roll-out, and gave the decision to local councils. Bundaberg was the first to drop fluoride.

ALAN BUSH, BUNDABERG REGIONAL COUNCIL: A lot of people anti-fluoride people that sent me emails and talked to me about the health issues and it makes one wonder and concern why it comes out of aluminium smelters, chimneys in China hand they don't put it in their water and they export it to us to put in our water. I don't believe that - there's something wrong there somewhere and we shouldn't have to force people to drink water with fluoride in it.

(SOUND OF APPLAUSE)

MATT WORDSWORTH: Now it's a fight being waged town by town, council by council.

MICHAEL FOLEY, DIRECTOR, BRISBANE DENTAL HOSPITAL: So thank you very much for the invitation to speak.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Queensland Health has dispatched senior dentist Dr Michael Foley to argue that fluoride is an effective public health measure.

MICHAEL FOLEY: The science is very much on one side of the argument. There are no reputable health authorities anywhere in the world that oppose water fluoridation. There are certainly individuals and sometimes smart individuals and there are certainly single issue groups, but the health groups around the world and the science groups around the world are strongly on the side of fluoridation.

MATT WORDSWORTH: A study in the 1990s which compared children in fluoridated Townsville to non-fluoridated Brisbane found about 60 per cent fewer dental caries or incidence of tooth decay in the Townsville children.

MICHAEL FOLEY: We will have to look at the big picture and we say in the long term, this will save us money. Save us an absolute truckload of money and it will make us healthier. It's a no-brainer. Fluoride is a winner. People in other States look at not just dental people, but people who come up from other States look at us and they just shake their heads and they say, you don't have fluoride in the water or haven't you always had fluoride in the water? Well, no, we haven't.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Some councils are thankful for being given the power to decide. Others feel public health is not their jurisdiction. And it should be the responsibility of Queensland's Health Minister Lawrence Springborg.

LAWRENCE SPRINGBORG, QUEENSLAND'S HEALTH MINISTER: We understand people want to make different decisions to central government agencies and not be dictated to and we respect that as well. We just ask them to have a debate on all the information, if upon that they feel they're uncomfortable to proceed with fluoridation, we do respect that.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Even if it's to their own detriment?

LAWRENCE SPRINGBORG: That's a very subjective thing.

MATT WORDSWORTH: It's not subjective according to your own department. You have Dr Michael Foley out there saying it's an important public health measure.

LAWRENCE SPRINGBORG: Some people have a different and a very, very heartfelt view with regards to this we'd just say to them that we encourage you to look at the positive benefits that could come from the fluoridation of water supplies.

MERILYN HAYNES: So this is what we do. We have a reverse osmosis filter.

MATT WORDSWORTH: Yep.

MERILYN HAYNES: This is the reverse osmosis part on top and these are carbon filters down here.

MATT WORDSWORTH: So this strips the fluoride from the water?

MERILYN HAYNES: Yep, yep.

MATT WORDSWORTH: At home in Brisbane, Ms Haynes refuses to accept the assurances of major medical groups.

People interstate where water fluoridation has been going on for 40 years will look to Queensland and think, what's going on up there? They're going to think that we're kooks.

MERILYN HAYNES: We're not the odd ones out. They're the crazy ones for fluoridating. Ninety-five per cent of the world doesn't fluoridate and they have just as good a teeth or better.

MATT WORDSWORTH: If anything, the recent success with councils has made her resolve even stronger.

MERILYN HAYNES: We've been campaigning for six years now. And spent six years already, I'm happy to spend another six.

LEIGH SALES: Matt Wordsworth reporting.