CONTENTS
1. Higher Cancer Rates than Any Previous Generation
2. PFAS - It's Inside All of Us
3. CANCER: dramatic rise in people under 50
4. Stomach Cancer Rising in Young Women
5. Plastic is Accumulating in Us
6. Microplastics in Your Brain
7. Tapeworm in Your Sushi?
8. Noise Can Make You Sick
9. Rat Lungworm, brain-infecting parasite worms
10. Alcohol Can Affect Your Health
11. Prion Brain Disease Rising in the U.S.
12. GNC now owned by China
13. PFOA Danger
14. Danger Alert - PFAS Harming Hawaii
Higher Cancer Rates Than Any Previous Generation
I subscribe to Scientific American. Lauren Young reported a major new study projects that members of Generation X have higher rates of developing cancer than their parents and grandparents. Gen X are people born between 1965 and 1980. This study was published in JAMA Network Open. [Journal of American Medical Association].
Compared to earlier generations, Baby Boomers (born in 1946 to 1964); Silent Generation (born 1928 to 1945); The Greatest Generation (born in 1908 to 1927), researchers found “startling increases” in cancers in Gen X including colon, rectal, thyroid, ovarian and prostate cancers.
Dr. Andrew Chan, gastroenterologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, who was not involved in the new research, said, “It's really something that has been observed in multiple studies, and now I think it really is an undeniable fact that we're seeing cancer rise in younger people.”
Young reported, “Previous studies have reported that people younger than age 50 are experiencing higher rates of certain types of cancers, particularly those of the digestive system.” Colorectal cancer rate is steadily increasing in people younger than age 50 even though it's declining overall in the US.
No, it's not due to more screening and detection. Dr. Philip Rosenberg, a co-author of the study and a principal investigator at the National Cancer Institute, said many researchers insist more screening and detection are not pushing the new overall rates higher. He said, “People are being diagnosed not because [cancers are] being picked up through better diagnostics but because they're becoming, unfortunately, clinically and symptomatically apparent, and that is something that is not a feature of improved diagnostics.” Dr. Chan said more cancers are being detected at advanced, invasive stages. That cannot be explained by simply earlier detection.
Diet, exercise, and obesity are well-established risk factors. Dr. Chan said they could partly explain the rising rates, but “there's clearly other factors that are driving this rise that have yet to be identified.”
I am part of the boomer generation. Think about what the generation after us, Gen X, has been exposed to that we were not until much later in life? Processed food always comes up, but we were and are exposed to that too. That comes up because of the rise in digestive tract cancers. What else is the digestive tract exposed to? Cell phone radiation which the younger generations keep close to that area of their bodies while they are continually texting and viewing online. Yes, I know we are told there's not enough research. It's a multi-trillion dollar industry, like the tobacco companies, they produce their own biased research. Give it a few decades. In the mean time protect yourself.
Gastroenterologists, including Dr. Chan and Dr. Kimmie Ng, director of the Young-Onset Colorectal Cancer Center at Dana-Farber Brigham Cancer Center, say they have been treating more young people who do not have any family history of cancer, hereditary conditions, or underlying health issues or lifestyle choices that would raise their risk. Dr. Ng said, “They live very healthy and active lifestyles and they eat healthily, yet they are still being diagnosed with very advanced stages of colon and rectal cancer. And we are now also starting to see an uptick in very young people coming in with pancreatic cancer, bile duct cancer, appendix cancer---all of these different [gastrointestinal] cancers.”
It will may take a few decades or generations, as with tobacco, DDT, glyphosate, PFAS, and other carcinogens, we are presented with industries' denials and their own research. Eventually the truth comes out after many people die or get cancer. Do what you can to protect yourself. I do.
PFAS - It's Inside All of Us
“Pretty much every one of us in the United States is walking around with PFAS in our bodies. And we're being exposed without our knowledge or consent, often by industries that knew how dangerous the chemicals were, and failed to disclose that” (Erik Olson, senior strategic director for environmental health at the Natural Resources Defense Council). Hiroko Tabuchi reported for The NY Times, PFAS or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, a class of nearly 15,000 synthetic chemicals linked to serious health problems have been detected almost everywhere scientists have looked, drinking water, rain, Antarctic snow. Thought to be in the blood of nearly every American, PFAS has been linked by researchers to testicular and kidney cancers, decreased fertility, liver damage, thyroid disease and other health problems.
PFAS was synthesized by chemists at DuPont in the 1940s. It's now in many products people use every day, Teflon nonstick cookware; Scotchgard fabric protector; microwave popcorn bags; some shampoos; some skincare and cosmetic products; raincoats; firefighting foam; pesticides; etc. It entered the environment from factories, from products we use, and from landfills where the products end up. From these and other sources, PFAS accumulated in our water, air and soil. Industry documents released through lawsuits reveal manufacturers knew about adverse effects from PFAS exposure in 1961 but they did not make that known to the public.
Many people had to get sick, get cancer, or die before evidence of harm accumulated. Researchers cannot ethically expose people to chemicals suspected of harm to study their effects. Dr. Steph Tai, associate dean at the University of Wisconsin's Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and an expert in the use of science in environmental protection and litigation, said, “it takes a long time for health effects to show up.” The only way scientists have been able to assess those effects is through long-term studies, “natural experiments.” In the mean time, many people have to get sick, get cancer, or die to show harm.
Tabuchi reported, “A long and difficult cleanup is beginning. President Biden's 2021 infrastructure law provides $9 billion to help communities address PFAS contamination, and the EPA has said $1 billion of that money would be set aside to help states with initial testing and treatment.” Tabuchi said, “Meantime, new kinds of PFAS are still being released into the environment.” The companies are developing new chemicals to replace the ones they have to stop using, but the new chemicals are often similar to the old ones. The companies know it will take decades before we learn their adverse effects. How many people will have to be harmed this time?
CANCER: Dramatic Rise in People Under 50
Harvard University's Harvard Gazette reported, a study by researchers from Brigham and Women's Hospital reveals incidence of early onset cancers, including breast, colon, esophagus, kidney, liver, pancreas, “dramatically increased around the world, with the rise beginning around 1990." Many more people under age 50 are being diagnosed with cancer. The researchers conducted extensive analyses of available data. The study was published in Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology.
Dr. Shuji Ogino, professor at Harvard Chan School and Harvard Medical School and physician-scientist in the Department of Pathology at Brigham, said, from their data, they observed each successive group of people born at a later time, have higher risk of developing cancer later in life. He said, “We found that this risk is increasing with each generation. For instance, people born in 1960 experienced higher cancer risk before they turn 50 than people born in 1950, and we predict that this risk level will continue to climb in successive generations.”
Harvard Gazette reported, Dr. Ogino worked with Dr. Tomotaka Ugai and colleagues from 2000 to 2012, analyzing global data on 14 cancer types that showed increased incidence in adults before age 50. Possible risk factors for early onset cancer included alcohol, sleep deprivation, smoking, obesity, and highly processed foods. Dr. Ugai said, “Among the 14 cancer types on the rise that we studied, eight were related to the digestive system. The food we eat feeds the microorganisms in our gut. Diet directly affects microbiome composition and eventually these changes can influence disease risk and outcomes.”
Epidemiologist, Dr. Timothy Rebbeck of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute believes there has been an explosion among people under 50 of different types of cancer many of which deal with or are near the gastrointestinal tract: appendix, pancreatic, stomach, uterine. American Cancer Society found incidences of colorectal cancer in younger people have risen significantly in recent decades, with one in five new patients diagnosed being below age 50 in 2019, a rate that doubled since 1995.
Noor Al-Sibai, for Futurism, reported on one young cancer patient, 27-year-old Meilin Keen, who had her stomach removed at the end of 2023 due to gastric cancer. Noor wrote, “GI-based cancers like Keen's seem to be occurring among youthful populations much more often other types.”
Stomach Cancer Rising in Young Women
From National Geographic Premium Content for subscribers, Meryl Davids Landau reported, researchers examining comprehensive cancer registries in multiples states in the US concluded stomach cancer has been increasing at greater rate in younger women. For nearly 2 decades, rates for women under 55 rose at twice the rate of younger men. Stomach cancer in younger women tends to be more virulent. Dr. Shria Kumar, gastroenterologist and researcher at University of Miami, said, “These tumors are more advanced at diagnosis and they're more aggressive,” leading to worse prognoses. “The increase in stomach cancers mimics a similar jump in other gastrointestinal cancers in younger people including pancreatic and colorectal cancer." There are several theories on what is causing the spike, but Dr. Michael Cecchini, medical oncologist at Center for Gastrointestinal cancers at Yale Cancer Center said, “That is the question nobody has a good answer for.” Dr. Srinivas Gaddam, gastroenterologist at Cedars-Sinai Medical center in Los Angeles and senior author of the tracking study believes lifestyle and environmental changes in recent decades may be factors.
Symptoms include heartburn, abdominal pain, nausea, weight loss, vomiting blood. These symptoms tend to indicate advanced stage. The early stage is generally silent. With incidence rising in younger people, those with a family history of GI cancers or who are experiencing persistent symptoms should see their physician.”
Plastic is Accumulating in Us
Half of all plastic manufactured becomes trash in less than a year. 8 million metric tons of plastic ends up in the oceans every year. Mass production of plastics began around 1950. Plastic is from petroleum, like gasoline. When incinerated, they release dioxins and other cancer-causing substances into the air.
91% of plastic is not recycled. According to Britain's Royal Statistical Society and the National Geographic, only about 9% of all plastic have been recycled. Even the relatively small amount that gets recycled ultimately ends up as trash. With conventional recycling, or thermomechanical recycling, plastic is ground into flakes, washed, melted, and reformed into new products that are more brittle and less durable. Material from a plastic bottle may be recycled this way 3 times, then becomes unusable. It will be recycled into lower-value materials that will eventually ends up in landfills.
Do you want to do something? Buy and use less plastic. Do that for yourself and for the planet. Look for alternatives to plastic. For example, use glass or ceramic containers to store your food instead of plastic containers. That's also better for your health. As much as possible, buy and wear clothes made from natural fibers, without synthetic components.
Learn more, watch my short video (~3 minutes) → Plastic Pollution In You
A new study published in the International Journal of Molecular Science by University of Rhode Island researchers found microplastic particles can travel to the brain. Microplastic particles in drinking water ingested by mice accumulated deep in the tissue of organs such as liver, spleen, kidneys. After only 3 weeks of exposure, inflammation in the brain, erratic movements and other unusual behavior were seen in mice that ingested the microplastic particles.
Microplastics are everywhere, in water we drink, food we eat, air we breathe, in rain, and in our body. This study is evidence of harm it may be doing to us.
Tapeworm in Your Sushi?
A 30-year-old man in California experienced stomach cramps and bloody diarrhea. He went to the emergency room after seeing something hanging out of his anus when he was sitting on the toilet. ER physician, Dr. Kenny Banh, who treated him said the man gave it a pull and it kept coming out, moving, wiggling in his hand. He went to the ER at UCSF Community Regional Medical Center with it in a plastic bag. It was a 5-1/2 feet long tapeworm. The man believed he got infected from eating raw fish. He especially likes salmon sashimi. Dr. Banh said the man had not recently traveled and was not drinking questionable water, but ate sushi or sashimi almost daily.
A case report in medical journal BMJ on a 40-year-old man who liked to eat chilled salmon: he came down with what physicians described as “a watery bout of gastrointestinal distress.” A meter-long “tape-shaped object” “emerged from his anus.” It was a Japanese broad tapeworm, Diphyllobothrium nihonkaiense It lives in fish and can infect humans. The worms are found in wild Asian fish. According to a study in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's journal, Emerging Infectious Diseases, this tapeworm has been identified lately in North American waters off the coast of Alaska. Earth's waters are getting warmer. Tapeworm experts and biologists at Alaska Department of Fish and Game warned that salmon from American and Asian Pacific coasts and elsewhere are potential risk for people who eat fish raw. They confirmed it was the Japanese species using microscopic and molecular technology.
According to the CDC, most Japanese broad tapeworm infections go unnoticed because they usually cause few symptoms. Other cases of tapeworm each year in the U.S. are from eating beef or pork. U.S. Department of Agriculture recommends heating fish to an internal temperature of 145 degrees. Proper freezing of salmon can also kill parasites. Freeze to minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit or colder for at least 7 days or freeze solid at minus 31 degrees or colder for 15 hours.
A study published in CDC's journal, Emerging Infectious Diseases, reported wild salmon caught in Alaska waters were found to be infected with Japanese tapeworm, Diphyllobothrium nihonkaiense. Humans get Diphyllobothrium most often by eating uncooked or under-cooked fish infected with tapeworm larvae. With hooks or suckers, they cling to lining of the gut & feed on nutrients predigested by the host. Tapeworms are hermaphroditic with male and female reproductive organs. It can reproduce by itself or mate with another tapeworm. Most infections may be asymptomatic or usually will not kill you. There is medication to treat it. Symptoms include abdominal discomfort, diarrhea, vomiting, weight loss. Vitamin B12 deficiency leading to pernicious anemia may occur. Complications may include intestinal obstruction and gall bladder disease.
A local man, in Mililani, told me he saw bits of tissue that resembled proglottid segments of a tapeworm coming out of him when we was sitting on the toilet. He took it to Hawaii's Department of Health Lab to confirm it was tapeworm. Dept of Health sent it to experts at University of Hawaii Medical School. It was confirmed as Diphyllobothrium latum. A stool sample identified ova or eggs of D. latum. He said he had no symptoms. He has a degree in Microbiology and MPH in Public Health Laboratory. He had graduate courses in Parasitology. He said people without his background and no clinical symptoms would not know they are infected. He said it's likely there are people who don't know they are infected with a tapeworm because often it establishes a symbiotic relationship with the infected person and rarely causes clinical symptoms.
Dr. Janine Caira, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at University of Connecticut said, “It's not like every single piece of raw fish is infected.” But she warned, every day a person eats it, he or she is increasing the odds of getting a parasite.
Lead author, Dr. Thomas Münzel at the Cardiology Center at University Medical Center of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz said there's considerable evidence noise makes you sick and one of the predominant diseases is cardiovascular disease. Dr. Münzel said noise pollution, or unwanted environmental noise, is a risk factor for heart disease the same way high cholesterol and obesity may increase risk. It may also increase stress hormones levels. Over time that can take a toll on the body, increasing cholesterol, blood pressure, and heart rate. Dr. Münzel said if this persists for years, you have risk of coronary artery disease, stroke, heart failure, and arrhythmia.
Stress response is for survival when we are confronted by danger. To escape or defend against danger you need heart rate to increase. You need stress hormones like adrenaline. You need blood to clot more readily in case you are injured or wounded. Stress can also make you sick.
My e-Book #3 (coming out later this year on this blog) will have much information about this parasite, what you need to know, and what they don't tell you.
In Australia, Sam Ballard, a healthy, 19-year-old rugby player, on a drunken dare, swallowed a garden slug. The slug was carrying rat lungworm parasites, Angiostrongylus cantonensis. Those parasites infected Ballard's brain causing the serious brain infection, eosinophilic meningoencephalitis. He was in a coma for 420 days. The infection left him quadriplegic, paralyzed from neck down, needing to be fed by a feeding tube and requiring constant care and attention. He was released from the hospital three years later. Eight years later, he was still paralyzed and required round-the-clock care.
There have been some serious rat lungworm outbreaks in Hawaii often due to people eating contaminated produce. When people become more vigilant, the outbreak stops. Many people believe rat lungworm is only found in Asia and Hawaii. They are mistaken. It's been found in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. Partly due to climate change, it's spreading on the Mainland U.S.
The rat lungworm parasite lives in rats. Slugs, snails and other vectors, including frogs, land crabs, and freshwater shrimp, can become carriers during the worm's life cycle. People can become infected when they eat raw or under-cooked snails, slugs, or other vectors or if they eat contaminated produce.
Live Science, reported, “Though most of the known cases of rat lungworm infection have been documented in the Pacific islands and parts of Asia, a study published in May 2017 in the journal PLOS ONE indicated the parasite is now established throughout Florida.” Rat lungworm had previously been found in southern Florida, but the study found it in rats and snails in five Florida counties in both central and northern parts of the state.
“The researchers warned that the parasite, which is typically found in the tropics and only recently appeared in the continental United States, will likely continue to expand its range in this country. They said that the parasite's apparent ability to thrive in areas outside its historical range is 'alarming,' and as average temperatures rise with climate change, the parasite will likely spread into more temperate areas.” Rat lungworm appeared in the continental US in mid-1980s in rats in New Orleans. The rats are believed to have arrived on ships from areas that already had the parasites. Rat lungworm have since been found in Louisiana and Texas.
Dr. Heather Stockdale Walden, an assistant professor in the Department of Infectious Diseases and Pathology at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, who led the study said it is “probably more prevalent in the southeastern U.S. than we think.”
Be aware and be careful. Wash produce carefully if you live in areas where this parasite is known to be present. Even if you do not live in areas of concern, you should wash your produce carefully because produce grown in those areas may be transported and sold elsewhere.
Alcohol Can Affect Your Health
In addition to bad things alcohol can do to parts of your body like your liver, heart and brain, it also puts you at risk for cancer.
Here is some information from “Beyond Hangovers, Understanding Alcohol’s Impact on your Health” published by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, in the National Institutes of Health: Drinking too much alcohol can increase your risk of developing certain cancers. Numerous studies show the more you drink the higher your risk for developing a variety of cancers. The National Cancer Institute identifies alcohol as a risk factor for the following types of cancer: mouth, esophagus, pharynx, larynx, liver and breast.
One study that followed 1.2 million middle-aged women over 7 years found alcohol increases women’s risk of developing cancers of the breast, mouth, throat, rectum, liver, and esophagus. The study concluded that cancer risk increases no matter how little or what kind of alcohol a woman drinks. Even one drink a day can raise risk, and it continues to rise with each additional drink. While men did not participate in this study, the researchers believe this risk is likely similar for men.
Smoking and drinking together intensifies the cancer-causing properties of each substance and poses an even greater risk. People who drink and smoke are 15 times more likely to develop cancers of the mouth and throat than nondrinkers and nonsmokers.
Drinking too much alcohol weakens the immune system, making your body an easier target for disease; more vulnerable to bacteria and viruses; and less capable of destroying cancerous cells. With a compromised immune system, chronic drinkers are at higher risk to contract diseases like pneumonia and tuberculosis than people who do not drink too much. There is also data linking alcohol’s damage to the immune system with an increased susceptibility to contracting HIV infection.
Drinking a lot on a single occasion can also compromise your immune system. Drinking to intoxication can reduce your ability to fight off infections up to 24 hours after getting drunk. If a drunk driver or drunk pedestrian is injured in a serious traffic accident, alcohol affects wound healing. Dr. Elizabeth Kovacs, Director of the Alcohol Research Program at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine said, “Alcohol impairs the ability to fight infections, repair wounds, and recover from injuries.”
Prion Brain Disease Rising in the U.S.
University of Nebraska Medical Center Global Center for Health Security, in 2022, launched The Transmission, providing news and data focused on global health security, led by Claudinne Miller, former Dept. of Defense Intelligence analyst. Miller, for years, produced reports to top-level US government leadership and international public health, academic and government leaders about outbreaks like H5N1, H1N1, Ebola, and COVID. She has extensive background working in emerging infectious diseases as an intelligence analyst with experience in the US Intelligence Community and US Dept. of Defense.
December 2023 news published in The Transmission included, “Prion Disease Rising in the U.S.” It reported Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) incidence increased consistently from 2007 to 2020. John Probasco, MD and Matthew Cranc, BS, both at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and co-authors of the study, said, “Our findings indicate the reported incidence of CJD has risen considerably” It's the most common human prion disease.
CJD causes dementia and death. Another prion disease is variant CJD linked to bovine spongiform encephalopathy (Mad Cow disease) by contaminated meat. First detected in Britain in 1990s, usually in young people. Another fatal prion brain disease is Kuru in New Guinea cannibals who ate human brains. Those are more commonly known prion diseases (transmissible spongiform encephalopathy) in humans. This is only the beginning of this information. 5 parts to this post. Earlier parts posted then deleted due to limited space.
Dr. Thomas Pringl, a scientific consultant for the Sperling Foundation, a charitable public health organization, said some published reports estimate 6 to 8 percent of people who are told they have Alzheimer's disease may actually have a form of CJD.
Blakeslee had a scary warning, which medical science knows is true: “a deeper reason to worry is the diabolical nature of the infectious prion particle. It seemingly cannot be destroyed. When medical instruments contaminated with prions are boiled at high temperatures for 30 minutes, the prions remain infectious, and have passed the infection from person to person. When infected materials are incinerated, the ash contains prions, which remain infectious.”
PFOA danger - part 1
I subscribe to The NY Times. The Times Magazine article by Nathaniel Rich is sadly a true story everyone should know. Here's a small part of that story.
Wilbur Tennant owned a small cattle farm in Parkersburg, West Virginia. In late 1990’s he believed DuPont's chemical plant in Parkersburg was responsible for his cows dying. He tried to get help locally, but he said DuPont just about owned the entire town. He was turned away by Parkersburg lawyers, politicians, journalists, doctors, veterinarians.
His brother Jim sold 66 acres of their land to DuPont in 1980’s for a landfill for a DuPont plant. Jim worked at that plant and was in poor health with mysterious ailments doctors could not diagnose.
A creek ran through that landfill, down to a pasture where the Tennants’ cattle grazed. After DuPont began using the landfill Wilbur Tennant noticed the cattle began to act deranged. He found dead deer and dead cattle at the creek. Blood had run out of their nose and mouth. A video he took showed a large pipe with outflow into the creek, discharging green water. This is what cows on his property were drinking.
Videos and photographs showed cows with giant lesions protruding from their hides; cows with constant diarrhea, cows slobbering white slime the consistency of toothpaste, staggering bowlegged like drunks; cows with eyes that showed a lot of suffering. Tennant lost one hundred fifty-three cows.
He hired attorney Rob Bilott who discovered the chemical involved was PFOA, perfluorooctanoic acid, a type of PFAS. He had to get a court order to force DuPont to release their documents on this substance, some going back a half century. Bilott said, “They had known for a long time that this stuff was bad.”
In 1951 DuPont started purchasing PFOA from 3M the company that invented PFOA. DuPont referred to PFOA as C8 and used it to manufacture Teflon. 3M sent DuPont recommendations on how to dispose of it. DuPont’s own instructions specified it was not to be flushed into surface water or sewers, but for decades DuPont pumped hundreds of thousands of pounds of PFOA through outfall pipes of the Parkersburg facility into the Ohio River. DuPont dumped 7,100 tons of PFOA-laced sludge into open, unlined pits from which the chemical could seep into the ground. PFOA entered the local water table, which supplied drinking water to neighboring communities, more than 100,000 people.
3M and DuPont conducted secret medical studies on PFOA, for more than 4 decades. PFOA was found to bind to plasma proteins in blood, thus circulating through every organ in the body. In 1970’s DuPont discovered high concentrations of PFOA in blood of factory workers. In 1981, 3M found ingestion of PFOA caused birth defects in rats. By 1990s DuPont knew PFOA caused cancerous testicular, pancreatic, and liver tumors in lab animals. One laboratory study suggested possible DNA damage from PFOA exposure, and a study of workers linked exposure with prostate cancer.
PFOA danger – part 2
In 1991 DuPont scientists determined safe limit for PFOA concentration in drinking water is one part per billion. That year DuPont found water in one local district contained PFOA levels at three times that amount. DuPont did not make that information known to the public.
Rob Bilott said, “DuPont had for decades been actively trying to conceal their actions. They knew this stuff was harmful, and they put it in the water anyway.”
By 2003 the average concentration of PFOA in the blood of an adult American was four to five parts per billion.
Wilbur Tennant came down with cancer and died of a heart attack. Two years later his wife died of cancer. In 2011, after studying West Virginians who had been drinking PFOA-laced water for decades, scientists began to release their medical findings. They said there was a probable link between PFOA and kidney cancer, testicular cancer, thyroid cancer, thyroid disease, high cholesterol, pre-eclampsia and ulcerative colitis. PFOA has also been linked to breast cancer and prostate cancer.
Nathaniel Rich wrote, “200 scientists from a variety of disciplines signed the Madrid Statement, which expresses concern about the production of all fluorochemicals, or PFAS, including those that have replaced PFOA. PFOA and its replacements are suspected to belong to a large class of artificial compounds called endocrine-disrupting chemicals; these compounds, which include chemicals used in the production of pesticides, plastics, and gasoline, interfere with human reproduction and metabolism and cause cancer, thyroid problems and nervous-system disorders. . . . endocrinology research has found that even extremely low doses of such chemicals can create significant health problems.”
DANGER Alert – PFAS Harming Hawaii
Leila Fujimori reported for StarAdvertiser [Sun, Dec 17, B2], Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez filed a lawsuit against 25 manufacturers of PFAS chemicals (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), forever chemicals, that “contaminated our environment and can cause serious health problems for people of Hawaii.” Lopez said, corporations that created and unjustly profited from sale of PFAS concealed serious risks to human health and the environment. The lawsuit alleges manufacturers' “deceptive and unlawful actions” caused or contributed to PFAS contamination of our air, soil, surface water, groundwater, drinking water. For example samples of drinking water from Kunia Village, were found to have perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS, a type of PFAS) at levels as high as 12.5 times higher than proposed federal maximum contaminant level.
“By today's standards, the maximum concentration of PFOS measured at [Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in 2022] would be approximately 655,000 times higher than what EPA considers health-protective.”
Some of the harm U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) warned PFAS chemicals can cause are decreased fertility; adverse developmental and behavioral effects in children; increased risk of some cancers, including kidney and testicular cancers; reduced ability of immune system to fight infections; ulcerative colitis; thyroid disease; medically diagnosed high cholesterol and obesity.
PFAS chemicals have been used extensively at Hawaii airports and military installations since the 1940s and were used in Hawaii by local, state and federal fire departments. They are in some common personal and household consumer products.
The lawsuit said manufacturers of PFAS chemicals knew for decades the dangers of PFAS. “Despite this knowledge, [they] chose to not take steps to reduce those risks and instead continued to advertise, market, manufacture for sale, offer for sale, and sell PFAS-containing products . . . to State and local government, businesses, and consumers so that [they] could reap enormous profits . . . [They] seek to foist the equally enormous costs to address those problems back on the victims . . .”
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