Been watching a show from the UK called The Repair Shop where they fix all kinds of old things. Man them people got some bad teeth.

Too much smoking and tea or what? Inbreeding?

I lived there for 13 months and I can tell you that it is the tea.

The Brits think the Americans are superficial because we see dental health impacts overall health.

It's among many other things they have not figured out for themselves.

They're not as bad as they used to be, I don't really notice them being that bad when I'm there for work. In the past I don't think they really cared about teeth, it was never in their culture. Until recently there nobody seemed to get braces even if they jutted out at all angles.

It wasn't until the last 50 years or so here in the U.S. that we really started taking care of our teeth too. I'm 51 and pretty much everybody I knew in my parents generation had false teeth. I can't think of anyone my age with false teeth.

Prince William's wife Kate has a great smile.

The ones I’ve met are pretty bad.

Lived over there for three years 50 plus years ago....the health care system was all socialized back then even..

teeth don't get much attention regarding basic health care... even in the USA..

Recall seeing that movie documentary that was out this past year, that was colorized videos from WW One..
the biggest thing that stuck out at the viewer, was in close up shots of men's faces, immediately you could see the bad teeth just about everyone had... and most of these pics were soldiers from then late teens to early 30s...

a mouth full of all their teeth and in good shape was a real rarity...which I gather wasn't much different in this country in those days...

It’s the National Health System, free dental care but IME not for cosmetic reasons.

OTOH here in America we still seem to me to be Orthodontist-obsessed.

The movie is "They Shall Not Grow Old", and let me tell you I certainly took note of the kids in their late teen with completely destroyed mouths from caries!

There are a number of factors that feed into the classic "Brit Mouth" syndrome. In the first half of the 20th Century, dental care was pure episodic. Poor went only when something hurt. The solution was extraction. That leads to problems with kids. The concept of just pulling the primary teeth because "they will lose them anyway" leads to space problems. Primary teeth need to be space maintainers to keep the erupting permanent teeth from erupting into the wrong position. If there are no primary molars, the first permanent molars erupt in, migrate forward and then horrible crowding is the result. Take a look at early photos of the Beatles and Stones. The crowded and misaligned teeth were a result of them having their primary molars pulled when they were young.

No fluoride. Britain was slow to adopt fluoride in municipal drinking water. I had a professor, Dr. Victor Della Gustina that worked with the NHS in Scotland to get that going for them in the 1970. Nice likable guy, he had some hilarious stories about the Scots resisting fluoride, thinking it would make their whisky and water taste funny. Anyway, kids who have fluoridated water have hard enamel and less caries by far.

Then their socialized medicine, the NHS, is just basic bare bones care. People don't make appointments, they just show up and wait to be called. The British approach to dentistry is still largely episodic, although the younger generation is embracing prevention.

Lastly, the British Isles have a mix of Celtic, Viking, Saxon, roman and who knows what other DNA that seems to give them a mish mash of mismatched genetics for upper and lower jaw size. More so than I see in French, Germany or Scandinavians as a rule. Africans rarely have that crowning problem, for example,e. Nice wide dental arch and big thick enamel and long roots. Asian have thin enamel and wimpy roots. There you go!

Straight teeth are easier to clean. Proper bite puts less stress on teeth. So straight, easy to clean teeth = less caries, less gum disease, less wear, less cracked teeth, and longer lasting teeth (if you do your part).

Like saying America is obsessed with oil changes and tire rotation. Want your car to last longer?

My first trip to South Africa in 1988, my PH met my plane in Kimberly on the tarmac. As we deplaned and walked down the stairs a man I'd never laid eyes on walked right, called me by name up and introduced himself. I asked how he knew which one was me?

"I can spot an American smile away. Straight teeth and white tennis shoes"

Fluoride is great thing; you can tell which kids were on ‘well water’

Of course now, you cannot. Because of the Erin Brockobitches of the USA have challenged its benefits and municipalities have cowered to pressure from a minority of voices.

Inbreds, they have really poor genetics

This reminds me of the line in the Freddie Mercury-Queen movie when the English reporter asked him, "Why haven't you had your teeth fixed?"

His response: "I am British, I didn't want to stick out".

my dad has them , i was blessed with Apache teeth.

Well said. How many anatomical features that appear deformed, disproportionate and misaligned are optimally healthy and functional?

Jay Leno once told a joke about a young British couple who went someplace no British couple had ever been before, for their honeymoon. The dentist. ;-{>8