People Were Treating Cavities 14,000 Years Ago--And It Wasn’t Pretty

Friday, July 17, 2015 - 15:00 in Paleontology & Archaeology

Ancient CavityBenazzi et al./Scientific Reports 2015This tooth is the earliest known example of dentistry.Going to the dentist isn't generally fun. You lie there, with your mouth open while someone picks and scrapes at your teeth. There's a reason they bribe kids with toys and those adorable tiny toothpaste tubes. But as you prepare for your next dental checkup, remember that it really could be so much worse.Researchers recently discovered the earliest evidence of people trying to treat cavities. A 14,000 year old tooth with a cavity showed signs of being scraped by a small flint tool.The objective, apparently, was to remove the rotting parts of the infected tooth. That isn't all that different from how dentists treat cavities today. When you go to your dentist with a cavity, they also remove the infected part of the tooth. The difference is, nowadays, they can numb the...

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