Why isn't there a major lack of institutional trust of dentists? Between 1990 to today fillings have gone from being torture to something that takes 30 minutes while I listen to a podcast. I've not met anyone who distrusts big dental. But fluoridated water is still a hot topic.

The best that the experts the paper talks about can do today is say that if we follow their advice our lives will get worse slower. Not better. Just as bad as if we don't listen to them, but more slowly.

In the post war period people trusted institutions because life was getting better. Anyone could think back to 1920 and remember how they didn't have running water and how much a bucket weighed when walking up hill.

If big institutions want trust they should make peoples lives better again instead of working for special interests, be they ideological or monetary.

> Why isn't there a major lack of institutional trust of dentists?

FWIW, I know a lot of people who refuse to go to the dentist unless it's an issue because they're one of the medical professions that seem to do the most upselling.

I go every six months for a cleaning and trust my dentist, but I can definitely see how these huge chain dentists become untrustworthy.

>Why isn't there a major lack of institutional trust of dentists? Between 1990 to today fillings have gone from being torture to something that takes 30 minutes

This one is personally hilarious to me. My dentist said there were "soft spots", that like a fool I let him drill. On the sides of my teeth. Those fillings lasted about 6 weeks before they fell out. He refilled them once, telling me to "chew more softly". Basically, he was setting me up to get caps... but he hadn't checked that my insurance basically covered 0% of such.

My own trust in dentists is nil at this point, though I desperately need dental work.

Dentists make their money by rushing as many patients through in a business day as they can. Boats to pay for, yadda yadda. There might be dentists out there that take their time, who pay attention to the patients needs, and are reluctant to perform irreversible and potentially damaging work... but those dentists are for rich people and I am not rich. Trusting dentists (in general) is one of the most foolish things a person can do.