http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/3697324.stm
October 7, 2004
Teflon's sticky situation
By Chris Summers
BBC News Online
It's on saucepans,
clothing, even buildings, but now Teflon - the famed non-stick chemical
- is at the centre of a slippery controversy about cancer and birth defects.
Since its invention
in the 1930s, amateur and professional cooks alike will acknowledge their
debt of gratitude to Teflon. Over the years, the non-stick coating on pots
and pans has helped turn out countless perfect fried eggs and cheese soufflés.
But for how much longer?
Environmentalists have called for the withdrawal of a chemical which is
a key ingredient in the manufacture of Teflon because of growing health
fears.
Perfluorooctanoic Acid,
PFOA for short, is a synthetic chemical used in the manufacture of advanced
plastics including Teflon.
Today, all new man-made
chemicals must undergo rigorous testing to be marketed in Europe. But
PFOA is one of 100,000 or so chemicals which avoided the test because they
were invented before 1981.
Teflon was invented
in the 1930s by DuPont, the US firm which uses it today to make non-stick
cookware, and also markets it as a coating for clothes and carpets.
Bucky Bailey's mother
became pregnant while working at DuPont's West Virginia plant
The company recently
agreed to an out-of-court settlement to a class action lawsuit brought by
around 50,000 residents who lived near its West Virginia plant.
The residents, who lived
along the Ohio river south of Parkersburg, West Virginia, claimed the company
had contaminated local water supplies with PFOA, which they alleged was
linked to birth defects and other health hazards.
Among the plaintiffs
was Bucky Bailey, who was born with a single nostril and a deformed face.
His mother fell pregnant with him while working at DuPont's Parkersburg
plant.
DuPont eventually agreed
to pay $50m in cash to the plaintiffs, plus $22m in legal costs. The company
also agreed to spend $10m on special water treatment facilities to filter
out PFOA.
But, crucially, DuPont did not accept liability and maintained PFOA did
not pose any danger to the public.
Water tests
"We want to make
very clear that settling this lawsuit in no way implies any admission of
liability on DuPont's part," says DuPont lawyer Stacey J Mobley. DuPont
have some brilliant scientists.. I don't believe they couldn't find an alternative
Dr Tim Kropp At the
same time, DuPont is facing another multi-million dollar lawsuit from the
US environmental watchdog for allegedly failing to disclose the results
of secret water tests in 1984.
It faces being fined $27,000 for every day since 1984.
Now, environmental campaigners
on both sides of the Atlantic want to ban the controversial chemical.
"PFOA accumulates
in the body and in the environment and studies on animals suggest a link
to birth defects. We are very concerned about it," says Karine Pellaumail,
from Friends of the Earth.
Dr Tim Kropp, a toxicologist
working for the Environmental Working Group in the US says tests carried
out by the US firm 3M suggested high doses of PFOA led to various forms
of cancer in rats.
"DuPont have some
brilliant scientists and I don't believe that they couldn't find an alternative
if they put their minds to it," says Dr Kropp.
'Respond with compassion'
But DuPont disagrees.
"There is no evidence that PFOA is harmful," says its director
of media relations, Clifton Webb. "We are very confident that there
are no health effects associated with the public's exposure to PFOA at the
levels we have seen."
FACTS ABOUT
TEFLON
Invented in US in 1930s
1946, first marketed by DuPont as Teflon
Has the lowest coefficient of friction of any solid material known
to man
Found on pots, pans, overcoats, bullets and pine lining
|
But, he accepts that,
in high enough doses, PFOA could be carcinogenic to animals.
As for those who had
suffered birth defects, such as Bucky Bailey, he says the firm would "respond
with compassion and concern, but they are not related to exposure to PFOA".
According to 3M's tests,
PFOA was present in five parts per billion in the bloodstream, says Mr Webb.
Workers exposed to it
were likely to have a level "thousands of times higher", he concedes,
but there was no evidence it was doing them harm.
As for substitutes,
the company has identified around 100 possible alternatives to PFOA - which
is used as a processing aid in Teflon - but none could produce the sufficient
"quantity or quality" required. Cost, he says, is not an issue.
Last year the American
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) launched an investigation into the
chemical's effects, a study which is being watched by the British government.
It acknowledges "considerable
scientific uncertainties" on the issue but says there is no reason
anyone should stop using Teflon products.
But the EPA is expected
to submit a more comprehensive risk analysis next month.
Last year the British
government called for a related chemical, perfluorooctane sulphonate (PFOS),
to be withdrawn. It followed 3M's decision to abolish the chemical from
its well-known Scotchgard products after health concerns were raised.
"PFOA is related
to it but nowhere near as much research has been done into it and we are
awaiting the outcome of the EPA's research," says a spokesman for Defra.
Others are seeking a
more restrained response. Professor Scott Mabury, head of environmental
chemistry at the University of Toronto, says a ban on PFOA would be "Draconian"
and the answer was to go back to the factory and make sure residual levels
of the polluting chemicals were removed in the production process.
"It's an engineering
problem," he says. "It's not impossible."
