PFCs

In the span of just a couple years, five of Heather Buren’s colleagues at the San Francisco Fire Department were diagnosed with breast cancer. At first, Buren thought the diagnoses were part of the unfortunate toll that comes with age. Still, something felt amiss — “it just felt so disproportionate to me,” she said. Around the same time, Buren helped a good friend and mentor within the department as she underwent a double mastectomy. Buren said it was at that moment that she decided to take decisive action. “(The cancer) just brought her to her knees,” she told me. “Now she’s good and back in…
A paper just published in Tox Sci shows that PFOS (the chemical that used to be the prime ingredient in Scotchgard) suppresses the immune system at levels, that didn't cause noticeable toxicity that are same as what are found in the general population. Great. So, basically, many people in the US who show no other signs may have compromised immune systems because of PFOS. And what's worse is that other compounds like PFOA, related to Teflon treatments (read more here), also have the same effects in other mouse studies. You know this is really a toxicologist's nightmare. I'd like to think that…