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Comment by kossTKR | Hacker News Reader

I live in a scandinavian country and PFOS was first found in extremely alarming amounts at various locations where cows have been raised, to such an extent that the local population is effectively poisoned and need life long screening if they have eaten any of the meat.

This has started year long tests and PFAS (+pfos, pfoa) has sadly been found in large amounts in most sectors. Even in just the tap water. The latest finding - today actually - is in organic eggs because of fish bonemeal in their diets, but this is just because these items were tested, apparently it's everywhere. Rain samples collected recently showed amounts exceeding the EU safe thresholds.

Point is, it's really, really bad and who knows what effects it will have. Counter point is that we've been swimming in a sea of inorganic chemicals for a long time and have just begun to test for them lately.

Effects on fertility, cancer, alzheimers, and the ecosystem in general is the joker.

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> Counter point is that we've been swimming in a sea of inorganic chemicals for a long time and have just begun to test for them lately.

Per/polyflouride compounds are not naturally occurring, this is all stuff that humans brought onto the planet in the last few decades - neither nature nor humans have had the time to evolve adaptations for exposure to them.

We as a species are in for a real wild ride the next centuries.

I for one look forward to the check from DuPont that will surely cover all this.

They’ll do what J&J pioneered and spin off a subsidiary that owns only the liabilities.

https://www.npr.org/2022/04/02/1082871843/rich-companies-are...

> Here's how the maneuver worked. First, last October, J&J spun off a subsidiary in Texas called LTL.

> Then, using a wrinkle in Texas state law, J&J was able to transfer all of the potential liability linked to the tsunami of baby powder asbestos claims into the shell of the new company, while keeping valuable assets separate.

> LTL then quickly filed for bankruptcy in North Carolina. That move immediately halted the baby powder cases, which could remain on hold for months or years.

You'd hope a judge would go "nice try" and apply the intent of law to them anyway.

It's a loophole in the law, it seems. I mean if law was simple and I was in charge, I'd just be like "yeah this was done by J&J at the time, nice try" and sue them anyway. But apparently it's not that easy.

Isn't that the purpose of Chemours?

Eventually, perhaps. Right now it's got assets and revenue.

It is absolutely disgusting that DuPont knew that these chemicals are harmful and accumulative in the body.

The spin they put on this is that "it is possible for these chemicals to be used safely", but the parameters for safe use are not realistic in the real world.

The fine print on your frying pan or waterproofing contains legal get outs that are unrealistic.

Nevermind the fact most paper straws, fast food wrappers (McDonalds) and others are lined with these chemicals.

They knew. They knew they don't break down, bio-accumulate and cause health issues, but still tell the world they can be safely used.

Jail them all.

> Nevermind the fact most paper straws, fast food wrappers (McDonalds) and others are lined with these chemicals.

I knew something was off about those paper straws...but they put PFAS in them?? It's like we're saying: copper is too damaging when mined, let's replace our water pipes with lead.

>but they put PFAS in them

Not sure about paper straws specifically, it's put in paper based fast food containers as a waterproofing/greaseproofing agent.

This was done when public perception turned against polystyrene containers.

Then McDonalds and many others, via packaging companies, greenwashed to paper looking containers lined with PFAS type materials.

The paper degrades and leaves the sealant in the environment.

Sickening really, given they know this happens. But if you can't see it happen, hey, better than polystyrene because it is easier to get away with.

At least my burger box seems greener.

Agreed, ban those paper straws, they are terrible. I just want my good old plastic straws back.

Might I suggest drinking with your mouth? :)

I don't understand why they don't have wax coated paper straws?

The insides are PFAS lined so the straw doesn't go soggy and become unusable.

Plastic doesn't seem so bad now eh?

>The fine print on your frying pan or waterproofing contains legal get outs that are unrealistic.

What world are you living in that has "fine print" on pans? The pans I bought recently certainly doesn't have them, probably because the PFAS/PFOS risk is only there during manufacture, not usage.

> probably because the PFAS/PFOS risk is only there during manufacture, not usage

That's not true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymer_fume_fever

My wording was a bit imprecise, but it should be obvious the thread that we're talking about "PFAS/PFOS ending up in body" risk.

And that’s also not true. Cooking with Teflon or other types of non-stick cookware based on these types of chemicals will result in those chemicals contaminating your food. In particular, pre-heating non stick pans is particularly bad, as is the use of the wrong utensils which will cause physically perceptible particles of the material to end up in your food.

Any non stick pan comes with a warning you can’t use it in the same house/building as pet birds. Just like canaries in a coal mine, birds are highly susceptible to things which are also dangerous to humans. Just because it doesn’t kill you dead within minutes of turning on the burner does not make it safe.

>And that’s also not true. Cooking with Teflon or other types of non-stick cookware based on these types of chemicals will result in those chemicals contaminating your food. In particular, pre-heating non stick pans is particularly bad, as is the use of the wrong utensils which will cause physically perceptible particles of the material to end up in your food.

source? The guidance from the FDA contradicts your claim

>Some PFAS are approved for use in the manufacture of non-stick cookware coatings. These coatings are made of molecules that are polymerized (i.e., joined together to form large molecules) and applied to the cookware through a heating process that tightly binds the polymer coating to the cookware. Studies show that this coating contains a negligible amount of PFAS capable of migrating to food. Similarly, the PFAS used in manufacturing of gaskets that come into contact with food do not pose a safety risk because they are also made of molecules that are polymerized.

https://www.fda.gov/food/process-contaminants-food/questions...

have you ever seen a non stick pan that someone used metal utensils on? flaked off areas of the non stick coating are apparent.

The FDA doc isn't explicit on this, but my impression is that the coating itself is polymerized and is therefore inert, unlike the PFAS/PFOA that's in the water supply or whatever.

These studies are based on manufacturer guidelines for product use (heat range, material handling), most of which are shown so narrow in scope that in your average kitchen the test environment doesn't exist.

Like giving people a drink that can only be stored below 5C or it may become dangerous. Is your fridge exactly always below 5C? Mine isn't.

Perhaps the only fine print I've seen on PTFE-coated pans is that they should not be heated above 500F/250C. My understanding is that, under these temperatures, decomposition of the PTFE is not possible.

Yeah but it has been shown in normal cooking these temps are often exceeded.

Hence the material being dangerous under normal conditions.

Do you cook steak with a thermometer on the pan?

Define "normal conditions". Searing a steak is arguably "normal", but it's also not something that I'm going to do with a non stick. If I'm stir frying some veggies, or cooking some eggs, I'm probably fine because the oil will start burning before the pan starts emitting fumes.

Normal as in, anything that may reasonably happen in a consumer kitchen.

I'm sure plenty of people sear steak in a non-stick pan.

You're not paying enough attention. The last pan I bought that had PFAS-based non-stick coating stated:

(a) do not heat above 220C (b) do not use metal utensils

This isn't because they think these things won't happen (they know they will, and you do too). And it isn't because they want to ensure the longevity of your pan (the opposite is true). It's because they can say that the pan was used incorrectly, as highlighted by FDA testing parameters, and therefore liability for any ingesting of hazardous material is the user's problem.

If you scratch the pan, you are generating micro particles of PFAS that eventually turn into the stuff some people are worried about.

Now, on the scale of things, probably the obesity epidemic due to sedentary life styles, sugar, etc. is 10-100x more of a societal health issue, but it’s harder to blame someone else for that.

> If you scratch the pan, you are generating micro particles of PFAS that eventually turn into the stuff some people are worried about.

Are they the same thing though? The "PFAS contaminated water" are from chemical plants or firefighting foam. That's not exactly the same thing as the polymerized coatings that's on pans. They're all vaguely PFAS adjacent, but people seem to be lumping the fumes (from burning their pans), the coating itself, and the precursor chemicals as if it's one thing, which probably isn't correct. paraffin, gasoline, and plastic are all petroleum adjacent, but they're all vastly different chemicals with different safety profiles. They all might be bad for you, but for different reasons. Just because plastic might be leeching chemicals that give you breast cancer, doesn't mean that you're going to get breast cancer from touching candles.

“They're all vaguely PFAS adjacent, but people seem to be lumping the fumes (from burning their pans), the coating itself, and the precursor chemicals as if it's one thing, which probably isn't correct.”

This is true, PFOS is not the same as PFAS, but the media already is fear mongering enough that politicians and juries are thinking it’s all the same. This is probably analogous to what happened with nuclear science, where the risks were worth it but we opted for more dangerous technology because of fear.

You mean the company that caused the deaths of 4000 people in Bhopal in night and didn’t have a single consequence?

While Bhopal was a terrible tragedy and absolutely criminal, it was Union Carbide who were responsible and not DuPont.

Point still stands, and importantly, Dow and DuPont merged in 2015.

Mine comes next month - about $4,000 out of the class action - because through the 70s-90s, Wolverine dumped contaminated leather scraps and chemical drums in a swamp uphill of the well I've been drinking from for more than a decade. Now every well in town has 50-200 mg/L of PFAs.

It's only $4,000 because the court saw clear evidence that the value of my home was damaged, but couldn't assign damages based on an increased risk of cancer; I would have had to actually get cancer to sue successfully for damages there.

I think that mcg/L, right? 200mg/L would be insane!

You're correct, yes, micrograms or ug/L. Nanograms per milliliter. Parts per trillion.

For context, the old USDA/EPA threshold for health hazards was 70 ppt, new June 2022 directives say "negative health effects may occur with concentrations of PFOA or PFOS in water that are near zero and below EPA’s ability to detect at this time."

Too late to edit...

No problem. I just couldn't help but picture in my mind someone drinking a slurry of PFAS. I was like, that can't be right lol.

DuPont had US$1.79 billion cash on hand as of September 2022.

If ten million people have been negatively affected by PFOS (surely an undercount) then that's a fat US$179 per person.

"Okay, so force them to pay a portion of future profits."

Ah, the Purdue Pharma solution. But is everything else that DuPont making known to be harmless? If we discover a PFOS-2 in ten years, should they be required to keep making it in order to pay off the victims of PFOS-1?

The problem with taking over a company to operate it in the national interest is that a country can be tempted to continue operating it in the national interest. In 1947, the UK nationalized all its coal mines. In 1966, a coal mining waste pile collapse and killed 116 children and 28 adults.

Nobody was ever prosecuted, and no person ever went to jail. What was the government going to do, punish itself?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster

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