You're watching Southwest Florida in focus.

Coming up.

State leaders make the move to change what is coming out of faucets statewide.

It's forced medication when they're jamming fluoride into your water supply.

Florida becomes the second state to ban fluoride from public drinking water, raising concerns from some medical professionals about its impact on children's health.

From the Sunshine State to the moon.

Why one astronaut feels that now is the perfect time to relocate NASA's headquarters to Florida Space Coast.

And from little brother to the head of the Catholic Church, we go to Port Charlotte to talk with the older sibling of Pope Leo the 14th to learn what it was like to grow up with the future pontiff.

Hello, I'm Sandra Victorova.

Thank you for joining us.

Florida becomes the second state in the country to ban local governments from adding fluoride to drinking water.

The impact of the new law, which takes effect July 1st, will be significant.

2023 data from the state health department shows that more than 70% of Floridians on community water systems receive fluoridated water, and dentists are warning that the move will hurt children's health.

Supporters of the new law say Floridians have been forced to consume fluoride treated water without understanding how the mineral might affect the human body.

Here's Governor Ron DeSantis.

We should all agree that we want people to be able to make informed consent, have informed consent when it comes to these things.

Jamming fluoride in the water supply.

Irrespective of the, whatever for the teeth when you can get that other ways, you know, that's impinging on other people's ability, you know, to have access to water in ways that, that they may not want to be exposed to, to what is essentially a forced medication.

While the national debate continues to grow, what is clear is that Floridians are getting mixed messages about fluorides impact on public health.

sad.

Oh, there's little quiet time for the primary care team at Health Care Network in Naples.

Busy is typical for doctor Sal Anzalone, but the pediatrician is preparing to make an unexpected change to his treatment plan for many of his youngest patients.

Most people don't realize that his teeth are susceptible, especially if the baby's breastfeeding or bottle feeding.

The decay.

Anzalone says he'll begin prescribing fluoride supplements to children.

He's concerned about an impending rise in tooth decay.

Once fluoride is eliminated from Florida's drinking water.

Anzalone says he's seen what a lack of fluoridated water can do in rural parts of the country.

I'm very concerned because there's nothing like looking in a child's mouth and seeing black or decay, and I've seen and knowing that what that's going to mean for that child, for growth and development.

The pain and suffering that occur to children.

It's not necessary that when we have an answer, we've been very successful, but we're going backwards, I think, instead of forwards.

They can drink away tomorrow's tooth decay.

For decades, science experts have touted drinking water as one of the greatest achievements in public health since the country began dating water in 1945.

The Florida Dental Association says water fluoridation reduces dental decay by up to 40%.

I think it's amazing because it prevents the bacteria from growing, and also if there is a little bit of decay, it causes criminalization of the tooth that actually brings the tooth back.

But the state Surgeon general, Doctor Joseph Ladapo, has recommended against fluoridation of water due to what he calls the neuropsychiatric risk associated with fluoride exposure.

U.S. Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr said he plans to tell the centers for Disease Control and Prevention to stop recommending fluoridation nationwide and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which sets maximum levels of fluoride in water systems, announced it's also reviewing new scientific information on potential health risks of fluoride.

That line is the fluoride line.

The Immokalee Water and Sewer District says.

It actually turned off the flow of this tank of liquid fluoride in January.

Based on these state and federal developments.

Executive Director Sarah Khattala says it's a decision her governing board members studied carefully.

Our board members grew up in a motley, so they care about the community, and they want to make the best decision for the health of a Moxley.

So this wasn't an easy decision.

And because of the fact that there is a lack of dental care here before turning off the fluoride, she says her team kept fluoride levels consistently below recommended guidelines, the equivalent of less than one gallon of fluoride for every million gallons of water.

The $8,000 savings from removing that mineral this year will now be donated to Anzalone Health Care Network to help provide dental care to kids that need it.

Pediatric dentist doctor Douglas Keck fears low income children will get left behind.

That's my biggest concern is that there will be more children in pain.

Some of these children who can't afford care in a regular dental office setting will end up in the emergency room.

And unfortunately, it will increase the cost of health care overall, not just in dentistry.

The Food and Drug Administration is also taking action on fluoride.

The FDA recently announced it is conducting scientific reviews on ingestible fluoride supplements for children, with the aim of removing them from the market.

To help us understand the ongoing debate about fluoride and some of the potential health concerns associated with the mineral.

We are joined by Doctor Ashley Mallon, an assistant professor of epidemiology with the University of Florida.

Doctor Mallon, thank you for joining us.

Yeah, Yeah, thank you for having me.

So I was looking at some federal data that showed about three quarters of the US population in 2022 had fluoride added to their drinking water.

For years, we've been hearing that fluoride has a lot of benefits to our children's teeth and now there's so much debate about what the research really says, both the impacts, both good and bad on our bodies.

Is there good reason for the debate right now?

Absolutely.

So there has been a lot of new research on the impacts of fluoride exposure on the developing brain that has been published in the last ten years.

And really, even in the last year.

So as scientists and policymakers are learning more about potential impacts of fluoride exposure on the developing brain, these, you know, discussions around policy change are also happening.

So I understand you've actually conducted research on the impact of fluoride and the potential connection to neurodevelopmental issues.

I know one of those areas is ADHD.

Tell us about what your research found.

Sure.

So I conducted the first human study on fluoride exposure and ADHD that was published in 2015.

We found that states in which a greater proportion of people received fluoridated water, also had more children with ADHD diagnoses.

And then I led a study that followed up on this question that was published last year, last May in the journal Jama Network Open.

And we found that higher prenatal fluoride exposure was associated with more neurobehavioral problems in three year old children who were living in Los Angeles, California, and where these levels consider maybe higher than average the amount of fluoride in the water levels.

No.

So that's the thing.

These pregnant women were exposed to typical fluoride levels, fluoride levels that, you know, pregnant women in North America and fluoridated communities typically encounter.

I know another area you looked at was childhood sleep patterns and the potential impact that fluoride had.

What did you find?

Yeah.

So we looked at, fluoride exposure and sleep in among adolescents in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.

We found that higher exposure to fluoride in drinking water was associated with, higher odds of reporting symptoms consistent with sleep apnea, as well as other changes in, sleeping patterns.

Your thoughts on a state lawmakers decision to ban putting fluoride in public drinking water?

Look, this is a major policy change.

And it's one that is going to protect, the brains of children in Florida from unreasonable risk of harm.

Doctor Mallon, we so appreciate your time.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

After the break, there is joy for American Catholics.

As the world's first American pope celebrates his inaugural mass in Rome.

And for one, Port Charlotte family, Pope Leo the 14th Ascension is an unbelievable family feat.

This weekend, the world's first American pope celebrates his inaugural mass and is formally installed as leader of the Catholic Church.

Cardinal Robert Prevost defied the odds, becoming the guiding figure of more than 1.4 billion Catholics worldwide.

While he comes from Chicago, the new pontiff has a strong Southwest Florida connection.

Elizabeth and RG spoke with Louis Prevost, who still refers to Pope Leo the 14th, as Little Brother.

All I can say is when I heard the name, heard the news, saw him come up on the balcony.

My mind kind of exploded.

Went empty.

You know how they say when you die, you get life flashes before you?

It was almost that kind of a sensation because I flashed from my brother's.

The Pope.

Oh my God.

To remember back when he was two years old and a little turd.

And he and he's the pope.

That's Louis Prevost of Port Charlotte, the eldest brother of Pope Leo the 14th, formerly Cardinal Robert Prevost.

The world was stunned Thursday when white smoke rose from the Sistine Chapel, signaling the election of a new pope.

But what made this moment truly historic?

For the first time, the pope is American born, while the global implications are still unfolding.

Louis has already witnessed the immediate impact of his brother's election.

For days, I've seen him at church even yesterday.

There's great renewed interest in the church now because there's an American pope.

Maybe we need to go back to church.

Church?

You know, it wasn't quite like Easter when everybody comes out and goes to church.

He recalls how Pope Leo's leadership potential was visible even in childhood.

Well before anyone could have imagined where it would lead.

I think it was in the second grade.

One of the nuns told him during one of the classes, Robert, you're going to be the Pope one day.

How did she come up with that?

Out of the blue, right.

What did people see?

I we always saw something special about him.

Yeah.

And teased him about playing priest lot.

But as a kid, even me says that's never going to happen.

Yeah.

Just stop playing priest.

Let's go play army or something.

But he proved this all wrong.

And some of them.

Right.

He's pope.

Louis also reminisces about simpler times, including a visit to Port Charlotte's Twisted Fork restaurant and the realization that those casual family moments may now be behind them.

Is that only real negative?

I see, and that's.

Yeah, I don't want to say I'm jealous or, you know, the world took my brother away, you know?

But yeah, I think you'll be a little harder to stay in complete contact with like we have in the past.

Wasn't that?

No.

I think he'll be fine.

He'll do well at home, and the church will benefit greatly from his God given talents that he's had since day one.

From the streets of Chicago to the halls of the Vatican, the journey of Pope Leo the 14th is just beginning.

But in the hearts of those who knew him first, he will always be Robert, the boy who proved that sometimes childhood prophecies do come true, and they may not like that.

You know we may get smacked.

Don't address the Pope like that.

And he's my brother, right?

I can't help it.

So it's going to be rah rah rah rah until I can say I get told severely multiple times.

Just like a little kid.

Call him Your Holiness or calling Pope Leo for WGCU News, I'm Elizabeth Andarge.

55 years ago, an explosion forced Apollo 13 to abort a moon landing and make the unpredictable journey back to Earth.

Dozens of the brightest minds worked frantically at NASA, trying to understand every variable needed to bring the three stranded astronauts home.

Reporter Teddy Burns sat with one Naples resident to learn about his role at mission operations.

We went to the moon and back with 36 K of memory.

Okay, you can't turn your cell phone on or off today with that kind of memory.

Limited technology led to plenty of trial and error during NASA's Project Apollo.

MIT engineer Edward Grace was part of the team assembled to tackle the unknown.

Well, no one knew if it really was going to work because this was the first time a lot of things were done in space.

We're going to be traveling into an environment that we didn't know what the environment was, and we're worried about memory being corrupted or problems with it.

And so we had to devise a methodology to ensure that we weren't going to have problems.

Grace developed the spacecraft's primary guidance, navigation and control systems, a device that became critical during Apollo 13 ill fated mission.

Okay, we've had Apollo here.

This is here.

Some second place here.

We have had a problem where the explosion had occurred.

Was in the service module, which was attached to the command module.

And that's right where the heatshield is.

So no one knew if there any damage had been done to the Heatshield.

As part of the Apollo 13 mission operations team.

Grace was in Houston to watch his guidance navigation system help astronauts Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert, and Fred Haise circumnavigate the moon.

But gaining reentry to Earth posed an unforeseen risk.

And one of the big issues on Apollo 13 was when you have reentry, what happens is there's a polarization of the spacecraft.

The polarization around the spacecraft causes you to lose communications.

You have no idea how long it's going to be.

It's an unpredictable phenomena.

The efforts to bring the command module back from the moon was difficult, but the most excruciating period for mission control was the prolonged silence from the astronauts.

Blackout got the three minutes.

And we hadn't heard from.

I mean, it got to four minutes.

No one had heard from God for five minutes.

No one heard from.

A lot of people felt they had burned up.

And it wasn't until five minutes and 30s that we heard Jim Levels voice come over, which was 2.5 minutes longer than any other blackout period.

For his efforts.

Grace was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Richard Nixon.

But it's bringing the astronauts home.

That leaves a lingering sense of pride.

That was probably I still I talking to you now?

I got goosebumps.

For WGCU news, I'm Teddy Byrne.

As NASA works to return people to the moon.

The Sunshine State is not only the epicenter of its Artemis mission, but key in the revitalization of all things interstellar.

To learn more about a resurgent space industry, we are thrilled to be joined by veteran astronaut Winston Scott.

As a mission specialist, he logged 24 days in space on the shuttle, Endeavor and Columbia, and he remains on the Space Coast, serving as the director of operational Excellence at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

Captain Scott, welcome.

So great to have you here.

Thank you.

It is a pleasure to be here.

Thank you so much for having me.

So I was thinking, you know, I think there's a lot of excitement as NASA gears up for this return to the crewed flights.

What does it mean to you to see this new generation of astronauts hopefully return to the moon?

It's very, very exciting to me.

We haven't been to the moon in so long.

In fact, I was a student in school last time we walked on the moon.

So it's long overdue.

Some very, very excited about the program.

And of course, for those who don't know, argument two is coming up next year.

Well, we'll fly astronauts up and around the moon.

They will not land, come back home.

And then August 3rd, a year later, they're thereabout.

We'll actually have astronauts land on the moon.

So it's very, very exciting.

So you certainly had a decorated naval career flying helicopters and fighter jets.

And I guess NASA asked you to join the team in about 1992.

What was that like when they said, we want you to join the astronaut program?

Well, actually, I'd like to think they came and ask me, but but you have to apply.

Everybody applies.

I did and was fortunate to be selected.

When I received that phone call and I was I was a naval officer, obviously on active duty at the time when I received the phone call from Johnson Space Center and the voice on the other end say, congratulations, you've been selected.

We want you to come down here and join the astronaut corps.

It is like a life changing event.

Everything changes because now the newspapers get Ahold of the television.

Everybody wants to follow you through the program.

So it's just an exciting, life changing moment when I received that phone call.

My goodness.

I cannot.

I can only imagine.

So you took part in two shuttle missions?

That's correct.

Explain to us, what was your role in the in those missions?

Yes.

I spent nine days on the shuttle endeavor.

Then 16 days on the shuttle Columbia.

Everybody has many, many responsibilities.

But you have a couple of primary.

I was mission specialist two, which is kind of like a flight engineer.

I was part of the flight deck crew, the people that actually operated the vehicle, the command of the pilot and the flight engineer.

But my main job was Eva or extravehicular activity fastening for spacewalking.

So I got to put the Sudan and go outside.

I performed three spacewalks over those two missions.

And in those days we were preparing to build the International Space Station.

So I actually tested tools, equipment and techniques that astronauts would later use to assemble the space station.

I've heard, you know, other astronauts describe space, but I'm just wondering what what was that like for you?

How do you describe that that those moments, that feeling when you're out there for the first time?

There are no words to adequately describe it.

You know, when you first look out of the shuttle window at space, and then when I see space from inside my spacesuit, I'm outside floating my spacesuit.

You just the words to describe it.

But one thing I will say when you see the Earth from that perspective, not only do you see the curvature and the boundary of the Earth, but you can see out past the Earth that you can see depending on when you're up the other planet, see the constellations, and you realize how small and how finite the Earth is.

The Earth is not infinite as it might appear when we're on the ground looking towards the horizon.

You see the beyond the boundaries and gives you a sense of fragility and how we really to do a good job of taking care the earth.

This is our home, the only home that we know for a while anyway.

You know, we've been talking about how Florida has become such a hotspot for this resurging space industry.

We know that the two senators, U.S. senators from Florida, Rick Scott and Ashley Moody, have proposed moving the headquarters of NASA from Washington, D.C. to Florida.

Do you think that's important?

Well, my personal opinion, I think it's a great idea.

I mean, this is where all the action is.

The majority of space launches in America, and I believe the largest number of space launches in the world probably take place from right here on our Space coast.

So where else should headquarters be but where the action is?

Plus, it will be more cost effective to move headquarters here.

You spent a gazillion dollars renting buildings in Washington, D.C. you got buildings right here at Kennedy Space Center that are available for headquarters offices.

Also access to those offices by officials and by business people and so on would be a lot easier.

Is much easier to fly a passenger plane directly into Kennedy Space Center and landed in 15 minutes later.

Your headquarters building than to fly into Reagan National Airport and fight all that traffic.

So for many, many reasons, I think it's that would be a great idea to have NASA headquarters located right here in Florida.

Captain Scott, thank you so much for your time and sharing your stories with us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Coming up, it could be history in the making for the Florida Everglades.

The defending Kelly Cup champions are preparing for the next step in their quest for the four peat.

Florida Everglades fans are getting spoiled.

It's feeling like a spring tradition as the team closes in on another ECHL Kelley Cup championship.

The blades will square off against Canada's Trois Riviere Lions in the Eastern Conference finals this weekend at Hertz Arena.

Jennifer Crawford hit the ice to talk with players and coaches about their quest for back to back to back to back championships.

Excitement in the air and on the ice as the Florida Everglades practice drills at Hertz Arena, preparing for their grueling playoff schedule.

After already making history by winning the Kelly Cup three years in a row.

Last year, for me, it was just validity that we've done something no one else has ever done.

It wasn't by locker by chance, we were that good this year.

We're just we're so hated by everyone.

And in hockey, in our league, you know, everyone kind of hates the winners.

We're kind of embracing that.

And it fuels fuels my fire.

And I know the other the players fire a little bit, but, we're we're here to, maintain our status and be things of the Hill.

Head coach Brad Ralphs says physical and mental toughness both paramount to their success as they carve out their way to the Kelly Cup finals.

We kind of have a recipe for how we've been doing things, and it's working.

So, the players are they're all in.

They want to win another championship and they trust that what we're doing, can get them there.

So the momentum is player driven.

Ralph credits returning staff and players for teaching new players.

The importance of team culture.

Handling adversity and challenges and obstacles are all part of the equation, and it's how we handle those, the choices we make in those moments, moving forward, that will create our our culture and our culture will drive our behavior.

ECHL goaltender of the Year Cam Johnson has been with the blades six years, declining offers to be called up to higher leagues, opting to stay in Ontario, calling himself a forever blade.

It's special down here.

We got a great group of guys like great staff.

Everybody who's involved with the team like really cares about the team.

Really passionate.

So you kind of feel that like from top to bottom, like everybody wants to win.

Everybody wants to be here.

The coach, staff and team say they are grateful for their incredible fan base.

People like Belinda Hanley, a season ticket holder since 2006.

I just love it.

I mean, and knowing the boys, it makes the game so much nicer, so much more involved.

It's just a joy that you can't, you can't replicate.

So to have so many people involved, it's, I think that means more than anything to me.

There's a sense of accomplishment for everyone.

It's a pretty cool moment.

Everyone's part of the team.

I'm Jennifer Crawford, reporting from Hertz Arena for GCU news.

Tickets are still available for both games one and two of the Eastern Conference Finals at Hertz Arena this weekend.

Coming up next week, helping those who served our nation, the local organizations that are offering hope and a fresh start on life for veterans.

Join us for that story and much more next week.

And don't forget to like and subscribe to our WGCU News YouTube channel, where you will find all of our stories and those extended interviews.

Have a great weekend everyone!