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Do you know what the drinking water from your sink might be exposing you to?
A new study that was released on Wednesday by an environmental research and advocacy group has revealed that “forever chemicals” are present in the drinking water of dozens of cities across the United States.
The chemicals that the researchers found in drinking water are in the PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) family, and are typically known as industrial chemicals. They are often used in products such as waterproof fabrics, fire-fighting foams, food packaging, and cookware.
Some of the oldest types of PFAS have been linked to a reduced immune response, high cholesterol and other negative health effects. There are some kinds of PFAS that will never biodegrade, which is why they’ve been coined “forever chemicals.”
These chemicals are favored for those items thanks to their resistance to certain elements, such as water, fire, and oil–but it’s the same resistance that allows those chemicals to also stick around in the human body, or elsewhere.
There were two samples in the study collected in Quad Cities, Iowa, and Brunswick County, North Carolina that contained a PFAS concentration above the Environmental Protection Agency’s health advisory.
The researchers had samples of drinking water analyzed by a third-party laboratory for 30 different chemicals found in the PFAS family from 31 states in more than 40 locations.
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In 34 of the sampling locations where PFAS chemicals were detected, the contamination had “not been publicly reported by the Environmental Protection Agency or state environmental agencies.”
A senior scientist with the Environmental Working Group, David Andrews said, “Ultimately, we don’t know how many different PFAS compounds people are being exposed to, and I think that’s quite concerning.”
An environmental engineer with North Carolina State University, Detlef Knappe, agrees with what the study found, and believes that the population may have been exposed to more than what previous studies have estimated.
“A single sample can be grossly under or overestimating exposure that people have to PFAS through their drinking water,” he said.
In fact, the presence of these chemicals has become a hot-button issue for congress, and the U.S. House of Representatives recently approved a bill that would set a deadline for the Environmental Protection Agency to implement a national drinking water standard.
