One embodiment of the disclosure relates to a method of making an optical fiber comprising the steps of: (i) exposing a silica based preform with at least one porous glass region having soot density of ρ to a gas mixture comprising SiCl4 having SiCl4 mole fraction ySiCl4 at a doping temperature Tdop such that parameter X is larger than 0.03 to form the chlorine treated preform, wherein X = 1 1 + [ ( ρ ρ s - ρ ) ⁢ 0.209748 ⁢ ⁢ T dop ⁢ Exp ⁡ [ - 5435.33 / T dop ] y SiCl ⁢ ⁢ 4 3 / 4 ] and ρs is the density of the fully densified soot layer; and (ii) exposing the chlorine treated preform to temperatures above 1400° C. to completely sinter the preform to produce sintered optical fiber preform with a chlorine doped region; and (iii) drawing an optical fiber from the sintered optical preform.