To read the original article in full go to : Understanding PFAS - A Future Factual Deep Dive.
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Understanding PFAS - A Future Factual Deep Dive
Future Factual 'Deep Dives' take you behind the story - deep into the science behind the headlines.Â
Do you have PFAS in your drinking water?
The simple answer is yes. Use the interactive maps (link below) to discover the levels of forever chemicals discovered in water sites where you live. So what level is safe? Well in April 2024 the US EPA set legal limits for PFAS in water. The safe level for PFOA (also known as C8 the original chemical from the Teflon case) is set at 4 parts per trillion (or 4ng/L) as was its sister chemical PFOS. For Gen X (the chemical that replaced PFOA) and PFHxS the safe level is 10 ppt. It’s worth noting, however, that because PFAS accumulate in your body over time, even low levels of PFAS can keep your blood levels high. You can use this calculator to work out what your exposure might mean for you: https://www-pfas.pfas-exchange.org/report/graphtool/
Levels of PFAS in Drinking Water - Europe
Just how bad for your health is PFAS?
So there’s a lot of very surface level information out there about how PFAS is bad for your health, and surprisingly little in depth. The best and most comprehensive overview we could find is the guidance to and guidelines given by the USA’s Centre for Disease Research (link below). This podcast from the American Medical Association outlines the latest guidelines from the CDC about the health risks of PFAS, from the director of the CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, Dr Aaron Bernstein. For a deeper dive here are the CDC guidelines themselves: https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/26156/guidance-on-pfas-exposure-testing-and-clinical-follow-up
And for the most comprehensive document on health impacts, on which the CDC guidance was based (and the document that the Veritasium video refers to) then this report by the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine is the place to go : https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK582439/.