Seattle study of breast milk from 50 women finds chemical used in food wrappers, firefighting foam

In August 2019, Vera Harrington put a quarter cup of her breast milk in the refrigerator. Instead of giving this milk to her daughter Flora, she gave this milk to a team of researchers studying a widespread class of chemicals that have found their way into humans around the world.

These chemicals are called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances – or PFAS – and have been used over the decades in products that range from fire-fighting foams to cosmetics, non-stick pans, rainwear, stain-proof couches, some types of fast food packaging, and even dental floss .

Harrington, who lives in a townhouse in Eastlake, Seattle, was one of 50 first mothers in the Puget Sound area who participated in the study. Last April, she received the results that documented nine types of PFAS in her breast milk.

Harrington’s cumulative value of 146 parts per trillion was modestly higher than the median contamination level of 121 parts per trillion for all 50 study participants. But for Harrington, now pregnant with her second child, the results have been staggering. As she read through the results, she wondered what the sources of the chemicals in her breast milk could have been and how they could have been avoided.

A confidentiality cloak usually protects participants in clinical trials. Harrington decided to speak to the Seattle Times to raise public awareness about PFAS chemicals.

“I was really very worried and upset. I started to think … I had to buy new furniture and it got kind of overwhelming, ”said Harrington. “Then I had that moment when I realized that I could do my job as well as possible and I would still run into things that were beyond my control. Then it was really, really frustrating. “

The potential health effects of these chemicals are a focus of ongoing research by the National Institutes of Health and other organizations. Although much has been learned over the past two decades, there is still uncertainty about the effects of some chemicals and what amounts pose significant health hazards.

In laboratory animals, some PFAS have been found to present an increased risk of liver toxicity, decreased birth rates, and disorders of the immune and endocrine systems.

The worrying findings don’t mean mothers should shy away from breastfeeding. Study co-authors and other health researchers say the benefits of breastfeeding, which include improved protection against infection and increased immune response, still far outweigh the risks the chemicals pose to infants.

“In any case, the evidence is still showing that the breast is best – there are so many benefits,” said Dr. Sheela Sathyanarayana, study co-author and professor at the University of Washington Medical Center, whose research focuses on pediatric environmental health.

PFAS legacy

The first PFAS were developed in the middle of the last century. They are now made up of a class of more than 4,000 chemicals and their breakdown components, many of which are characterized by strong bonds between carbon and fluorine atoms that keep them in the environment and which have earned them the nickname “Forever Chemicals.”

Some of the worst environmental pollution in the United States has been documented at locations where PFAS was used in manufacturing, such as a Dupont facility in West Virginia that made Teflon. In 2017, DuPont and a spin-off company, Chemours, agreed to pay more than $ 670 million to settle more than 3,500 lawsuits filed by residents of Ohio and West Virginia alleging that they were in the air, land and water released PFAS pollution made them sick. The chemicals are widely used in industry across the country, and a study by the Environmental Working Group released last week – based on a review of federal data – identified nearly 30,000 sites that may have released PFAS.

In Washington, some water systems in Issaquah and Whidbey Island, and Counties Pierce and Spokane, have been found to have been contaminated with PFAS from fire fighting foam used in training. New regulatory standards for these chemicals have been proposed in Washington for drinking water. In addition, the legislature has passed legislation to phase out some products containing PFAS.

“Washington is absolutely on the front line. Our state is the first to pass a law banning PFAS as a class in fire extinguishing foam, and other states have followed suit, ”said Erika Schreder, co-author of the breast milk study and scientific director at Toxic-Free Future, a group that for a new regulation.

These chemicals can enter the human body in many ways, including food, food packaging, or drinking water, as well as through inhalation of dust and air in buildings where stain repellants or PFAS-coated materials are present.

A survey found that they are now present to some extent in the blood of 98% of Americans. PFAS migrates from the blood into the tissue, migrates through the placenta to the fetus and also into the milk that is used for its nutrition.

The PFAS study of the 50 Puget Sound women was a collaboration between researchers from Indiana University, the Children’s Research Institute at the University of Washington, and Toxic-Free Future. Their results have been peer reviewed and published in a May issue of Environmental Science & Technology.

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This study represented the first PFAS analysis of breast milk in US women since 2004 and offered a mixed progress report.

Two older chemicals that U.S. manufacturers no longer make – PFOS and PFOA – were found to be less than half the levels found in a 2008 study. But these two chemicals can linger in the body for years and still make up almost 40% of all PFAS contamination.

New PFAS with shorter carbon molecule chains are now emerging in higher concentrations than in the previous study, a trend that has also been noted by researchers in other countries. Two of these, PFHxA and PFHpA, were found in most of the milk samples from women in the Puget Sound area.

“These results make it clear that switching to newer PFAS in the last ten years has not solved the problem,” said Dr. Amina Salamova, study co-author and associate research scientist at Indiana University. “This study provides further evidence that PFAS are currently building up in humans. This means that we need to address the entire class of PFAS chemicals, not just variations on old uses. “

Go to the exit

The evolving PFAS pollution saga has led some companies to move away from using these chemicals, including eight fast food and restaurant chains with more than $ 130 billion in annual sales, according to Toxic-Free Future.

McDonald’s, for example, announced this year that it would stop using PFAS in all packaging by 2025, typically because of its resistance to grease. The action came after a 2020 investigation by Toxic-Free Future and Mind-the-Store discovered the presence of fluorine, which suggested PFAS on a small McDonald’s frying bag, Big Mac clam, and bag of biscuits, leading to a Petition led to the fast food chain that waived PFAS.

At Olympia, Toxic-Free Future campaigned for legislative action to curb the use of PFAS products, including a 2018 law requiring the Department of Environment to ban PFAS in food packaging as safer alternatives and more cost-effective alternatives are identified.

In a report published in February, the ecology department found replacements for four out of 10 packaging categories. That means those categories – wraps and liners, plates, pizza boxes, and “food boats” used to serve hot dogs – must be free of intentionally used PFAS by February 2023, according to Rae Eaton, an Ecology Department chemist.

The Ecology Department has started a second round of evaluations, which is expected to lead to a greater need for substitutes. The department is also developing protocols to test for PFAS before biosolids – treated wastewater – are distributed on farmland.

Meanwhile, in response to a petition filed by Toxic-Free Future, the state Department of Health is preparing to publish proposed “levels of action” for five PFAS chemicals in drinking water systems that cover most of the state’s population.

These levels range from just 10 parts per trillion for PFOA, the long-lived older chemical, to 345 parts per trillion for PFBS, which disappears from the human body much faster but has been shown to affect the thyroid and development in mice.

If managers of a water system determine that PFAS levels exceed these limits, they must notify customers and continue monitoring, and are entitled to government assistance in installing filters that can trap the contaminants.

The standards are expected to be finalized this year and set low enough to protect someone who may drink this water for a lifetime.

“We have to deal with the greatest exposure risks … and we have to take protective measures even if we don’t have all the information,” said Barbara Morrissey, the state health department toxicologist who helped develop the proposed standards.

Living with PFAS

Harrington found no obvious warning signs when investigating the potential sources of PFAS that have ended up in her body.

Harrington is a marathon and trail runner who prefers, if not exclusively, organic foods. She grew up in Chicago, studied at Indiana University, and made her way to Boston before moving with her husband, Neil Harrington, to take a job in the tech industry.

In their study sample, the highest measurement was for PFOS, which phased out of US production in 2003. Still, it could have been used as a stain repellent on old furniture or an old carpet in any of the buildings she lived or worked in over the years.

And she’s also looking around her condo to try to spot current sources of PFAS contamination, such as a seesaw she bought to nurse her daughter that has a stain-resistant coating with a newer PFAS formulation could have, and a carpet made by. A previous owner of the house was bought.

“I didn’t spend my life avoiding these substances because I didn’t know they would affect me and my future child,” said Harrington.

Harrington is now preparing for the birth of their second child, expected in October, and plans to breastfeed again. She is considering giving up the dirt-repellent seesaw that she bought before her first pregnancy and that is now in her daughter’s room. She also wants to avoid chemical treatments when cleaning carpets.

By the time she starts breastfeeding again, she hopes the PFAS levels will have decreased.

“I think there is still a little bit of unknown to everyone,” said Harrington.