Worrying rise in tooth decay amongst teenagers

The Australian Centre for Population Oral Health has recently published Child Dental Health Survey reports as at 2002 for Victoria, South Australia, the ACT, Western Australia and Queensland.

Comment within the Victorian report on selected trends over the period 1998-2002, included the following observation about an increase in decay rates in permanent teeth:

"In contrast to the deciduous dentition, the mean number of permanent decayed teeth has increased for most age groups compared to 2001 (Figure 8). For most age groups, a decrease was observed between about 1998 and 2000/01. The mean number of filled teeth has increased for some age groups but decreased for others, between 1998 and2002 (Figure 9). Mean permanent DMFT traces a similar path to trends in mean decayed teeth, reducing from 1998 to about 2000/01 before increasing to 2002 (Figure10). However, the percentage of children with dmft = 0 has been gradually increasing for most age groups between 1998 and 2002 (Figure 11). (emphasis added)