22 Crowns, Four Root Canals, About $5,000

Nine hours.

That’s how long Brian Quaid sat in a dentist’s chair in a single day.

When a reporter found him the next morning, his face was bruised and his mouth was still numb from the Novocain.

Brian is a carpenter and cabinetmaker from Seattle. On that one trip, the dentists fitted 22 crowns and did four root canals, then gave him a deep cleaning the following day.

Back home, the work would have cost him $50,000.

Here, about $5,000.

In other words, he paid a tenth of the price.

This is Los Algodones, Mexico, better known as Molar City.

Every morning, before the desert heat sets in, a line forms at the Andrade crossing on the California side. Retirees lean on walkers, some arrive in wheelchairs, and working people pull small suitcases… all heading for the dentist.

The town is only a few blocks wide, with about 5,400 residents.

Estimates of the number of dentists working there run from 350 to more than 1,000. And more than a million visitors a year walk across to see them.

It wasn’t always this way. During Prohibition, the town ran on cheap liquor and bars. Then in 1969, a young dentist opened a clinic right across from the border checkpoint, and others followed.

Why is it so cheap?

Labor, lab work, and rent cost far less. Mexican dentists also tend to start without crushing student debt, because the state subsidizes their training in exchange for a year of free community service. Their malpractice insurance is cheaper, too.

So the prices look like this. A root canal runs about $200, and a crown about $300. Implants run roughly $1,200 to $1,700.

Some clinics run like factories.

Sani Dental, one of the biggest, has 35 dentists, 3D scanners, and a three-story lab that can turn out crowns fast. Spend enough, and it puts you up for free at its own hotel.

Its hotel, Hacienda Los Algodones, can feel like a support group at breakfast, with snowbirds from colder states trading stories about extractions and bridges over eggs and refried beans.

But is fast always good?

Critics worry about the pace. Local dentists argue the volume makes them better. One told the reporter that a surgeon there might place 500 implants a year, while an American dentist averages about 80. Interesting…

And how does a carpenter cover $5,000? The story doesn’t say.

But spread over three years, it’s about $140 a month before interest.

For work quoted at $50,000, that’s a trade a lot of people would make.

Brian made it.