PFAS legislative overhaul? Experts warn US chemical regulations require revamp to prevent health risks

12 Jul 2021 --- A new paper published by the American Chemical Society is calling for “meaningful action” on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) to attenuate the “systematic failures” of US chemical regulation.

According to the environmental researchers, legislative strides should go beyond legacy contamination clean-up and also reduce current production and uses to limit future exposures.

“PFAS in food packaging are a particular concern because they may transfer to food and thereby contribute to human exposure,” Gretta Goldenman, the paper’s co-author and founder of Milieu Consulting, tells PackagingInsights.

“This means that exposures will continue far into the future, with increased probability of health impacts for our children and our children’s children.”

Imperative regulatory change
The paper authors call for a strengthened regulatory system to enforce existing regulations and enact stronger, class-based laws.

Doing so could reduce or eliminate the production of persistent, mobile, bioaccumulative and toxic PFAS compounds.

The paper warns only a handful of companies have produced the basic chemical building blocks for PFAS chemicals.The main US law in place covering chemicals – the Toxic Substances Control Act – has proven “quite effective at protecting the chemical industry’s freedom to produce and use hazardous chemicals, and less effective at protecting human health and the environment,” says Goldenman.

“The costs of health and environmental impacts from PFAS are passed on to public utilities, local governments and the public at large, which is not fair.”

“Requiring the companies that produce these chemicals to bear those costs would force them to be more careful about preventing harmful exposures and encourage the development of safer alternatives,” she highlights.

The “forever chemicals”
PFAS are a class of over 9,000 persistent hazardous chemicals used in industrial processes and consumer goods. Of these, only a handful have fully been toxicologically studied.

“They are called the ‘forever chemicals’ for a good reason: they do not break down in nature and will be with us for generations to come,” Goldenman explains.

US packaging is usually disposed of in landfills, where PFAS eventually separate from the packaging materials and leach into the land and aquatic environments.

“Even if recall were possible, practical methods for destroying PFAS are not available, short of incineration at 1200°C, which does not occur for municipal waste. So the PFAS used in packaging are here to stay,” Goldenman warns.

PFAS exposure is linked to immunotoxic effects, including decreased response to vaccines and possible increases in COVID-19 severity.Community impacts of PFAS
The socioeconomic impacts of PFAS are diverse: farms in areas with PFAS-contaminated water or soil may be forced to destroy harvests or products, or even cease operation.

Households and local businesses often purchase bottled water or install and maintain home water filtration systems to avoid exposure to contaminated drinking water.

PFAS also incur expenses related to testing and monitoring the contamination, as well as studying the feasibility of infrastructure investments.

Low-income communities may be unable to cover such expenditures and often have few options for cost recovery, especially when the source of the PFAS contamination has not been determined.

PFAS contamination is also likely to disproportionately impact vulnerable communities, states the report, due to historic racial discrimination in housing and occupational sectors.

Striving for legislative change, PFAS in food-contact packaging has been banned in Maine, Washington and New York, with other US states considering similar measures.

Health risks of PFAS food contamination
Exposure to the two most studied PFAS – perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonate (PFOS) – have been linked to kidney and testicular cancers.

In addition, they are linked to decreases in birth weight, pregnancy-induced hypertension, increased cholesterol and decreased antibody responses to vaccines.

Goldenman adds similar health concerns have been raised with respect to the PFAS that replace PFOA and PFOS.

Last year, a Mind the Store report investigated the presence of PFAS in food packaging from Burger King, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Cava, Freshii, and Sweetgreen. It found that nearly half of all take-out food packaging tested across major US food chains contains potentially toxic chemicals.

Since then, Burger King’s parent company Restaurant Brands International came under fire from public health advocates as it promised to address PFAS in its food packaging “within the next few months.” In March 2020, both Sweetgreen and Chipotle announced they would phase out PFAS in less than a year.

Ubiquitous exposure to many toxic chemicals, not just PFAS, reflects a “privileging of short-term industry profits over long-term public health and environmental impacts,” reads the paper.Laying down the law
Regulatory pressure is increasing as these planetary and human health concerns rise . “In Europe, work is underway on a restriction under the REACH Regulation that will ban all non-essential uses of PFAS,” Goldenman affirms.

PFAS in food-contact materials specifically are also under consideration, and already banned in Denmark, for example.

“The definition of essential use is that it must be essential for health, safety and the functioning of society, and there are no feasible alternatives,” Goldenman emphasizes.

“While food safety is certainly essential, alternatives to PFAS in food packaging are available. The food packaging industry as a whole will benefit from taking early steps to eliminate PFAS even before regulatory intervention.”

Legislative overlap?
The issue came into the spotlight in May when new testing by consumer organizations in Italy, Denmark, Spain and France found toxic chemicals in single-use tableware.

The authors place the responsibility for paying for legacy contamination on PFAS producers.Alternatives to throwaway plastic items like straws, cutlery, plates and beverage cups are now high in demand after the EU’s Single-Use Plastics Directive took effect on July 3.

Ultimately, the new study calls for more research on PFAS in both food and non-food packaging applications.

“Understanding the true extent of these costs will enable policymakers to make informed decisions about who should rightfully bear responsibility for impacts and compensation,” the authors write.

“Only a strengthened regulatory system can adequately protect public health and the environment, and end the practice of forcing the public and future generations to bear the financial and health burden of pollution,” they conclude.

By Anni Schleicher

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