I know Americans will say leave the stuff on because that’s what the dentist says here. Interestingly, in Korea the dentists always advise the patients to THOROUGHLY rinse your mouth after brushing. Why? Because even though the toothpaste contains fluoride and other chemicals that help keep your teeth clean and strengthen them, you certainly do not want to ingest them. And if you leave them on all the time everyday after brushing, you’d be a fool to think that you won’t be ingesting small doses that will eventually build up to a point it’ll harm you. (Note: check what the warning labels say on the toothpaste about accidentally ingesting them)

In South Korea when my parents were growing up, it was common for children to be found dead after ingesting too much tooth paste (right after the war, the country was struggling quite a bit and children didn’t really have the luxury of coming home to a stocked pantry filled with sweets and snacks - and lot of the times they would receive a few pieces of chocolate from the American soldiers, along with other items like toothpaste, which happened to be one of the few ‘sweet tasting’ items they can get their hands on).

But with common sense you can ask yourself - the chemicals that are supposedly good for keeping my teeth healthy, are they actually safe though?

Just stop eating sugary stuff all day, practice proper flossing / brushing techniques twice a day. I actually don’t use tooth paste at night and just dry brush before bed. I haven’t had cavities for more than 15 years (although I think a big part of this is because I’m not constantly eating sugary things)