Hunt E
Department of History and Sociology of Science, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia 19104, USA.
Am J Public Health. 1996 Sep;86(9):1310-7. doi: 10.2105/ajph.86.9.1310.
Once central figures in American public health, waterworks engineers are no longer involved in many decisions made about the public water supplies. This paper argues that the profession's response to the early fluoridation movement of the 1940s and 1950s marked a change in the relationship between waterworks engineers and the other constitutive groups in public health and contributed to the disenfranchisement of the waterworks profession. Sensing a potentially divisive issue, two leaders of the profession, Abel Wolman and Linn Enslow, took steps they hoped would prevent a rift within the profession and allow waterworks engineering to continue its association with the wider public health community. Although the leaders saw the fluoridation issue differently, neither encouraged the profession to consider it openly or to take up the broader question of what limits, if any, should be placed on treating water supplies to meet human needs. Instead, they opted to locate authority for fluoridation outside the waterworks profession with dentists, doctors, and public health administrators. As a result, waterworks engineers conceded a great deal of the status and prestige associated with decision-making roles in community health issues and have largely faded from view.
自来水厂工程师曾是美国公共卫生领域的核心人物，但如今他们不再参与许多有关公共供水的决策。本文认为，该行业对20世纪40年代和50年代早期的氟化运动的反应，标志着自来水厂工程师与公共卫生领域其他组成群体之间关系的转变，并导致了自来水厂行业被剥夺权利。意识到这可能是一个分裂性问题，该行业的两位领导人阿贝尔·沃尔曼和林恩·恩斯洛采取了他们希望能防止行业内出现裂痕并让自来水厂工程继续与更广泛的公共卫生界保持联系的措施。尽管两位领导人对氟化问题的看法不同，但他们都没有鼓励该行业公开考虑这个问题，也没有探讨更广泛的问题，即对供水进行处理以满足人类需求时应设置哪些限制（如果有的话）。相反，他们选择将氟化的决定权交给自来水厂行业之外的牙医、医生和公共卫生管理人员。结果，自来水厂工程师在社区卫生问题决策角色方面失去了大量的地位和威望，并且在很大程度上已淡出人们的视野。
