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Comment by Teknoman117 | Hacker News Reader

Teflon in isolation may be fine, but your average cookware still contains enough PFOA left over from the synthesis process to cause harm. The replacement to PFOA (GenX?) has also been found in modern Teflon cookware as well.

Also, Teflon out-gasses at temperatures well below your average stovetop flame. Toxic enough that you can't use Teflon cookware if you own birds. It'll kill them.

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> but your average cookware still contains enough PFOA left over from the synthesis process to cause harm

That isn't true.

"Studies show that this coating contains a negligible amount of PFAS capable of migrating to food." https://www.fda.gov/food/chemical-contaminants-food/question...

> Toxic enough that you can't use Teflon cookware if you own birds. It'll kill them.

This also isn't true. You can't heat your cookware above 500F / 260C, that's it. Which obviously no one does since everything would be burned black.

Oil is much more dangerous to birds than Teflon, since it will kill them at temperatures actually reached during cooking.

> This also isn't true. You can't heat your cookware above 500F / 260C, that's it. Which obviously no one does since everything would be burned black.

People do badly burn their food and ruin their pans.

Yes, that's true, but if it were oil they would also kill their birds. Teflon is safer for birds than oil.

Not necessarily; if it were oil they would notice the smoke, while the fumes generated by teflon are quite subtle until a much higher temperature. So there have been many cases where people killed their birds before noticing that anything was wrong.

While I'm totally comfortable with eating teflon, I'm absentminded enough that I've overheated cookware many times, so I wouldn't use it if I had birds.

Other HN user who killed birds this way:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32515924 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32516579

Even negligible amounts of something that never goes away and builds up in your blood is a problem.

It does not build up in your body, it builds up in the environment. The amount in your body is basically exactly the same as whatever environment you are in.

On top of that, how much PFOA would you imagine is even in a frying pan? It's already so little it's considered negligible, so unless you are buying new ones every day, even the negligible amount is not "building up".

Yet that negligible amount is enough to kill birds. What was that about miners and canaries?

> Yet that negligible amount is enough to kill birds.

No it's not. You misunderstood what you read.

To kill birds you have to burn the Teflon, and the Teflon smoke kills them. And you have the get the pan HOT - way hotter than anyone cooks. Teflon is not easy to burn, you can put a blowtorch on it for a short time and not affect it.

but your average cookware still contains enough PFOA left over from the synthesis process to cause harm.

Citation needed.

The fumes are quite toxic. Toxic enough that you can't use Teflon cookware if you own birds.

The dose makes the poison.

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