Last week The Intercept released the first of a three part series on DuPont’s use of Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), also known as C8. Entitled “The Teflon Toxin” the article summarizes DuPont’s decades of deception, and details the serious health consequences that have resulted from the company's longstanding deceit.

C8 was an essential ingredient of Teflon as well as hundreds of products, including waterproof clothing, coatings for eyeglasses, stain-proof coatings for carpets and furniture, fire-fighting foam, fast food wrappers, ski wax, and pizza boxes. Unfortunately, years of research have now linked this chemicals to various health conditions including ulcerative colitis, high cholesterol, pregnancy-induced hypertension, thyroid disease, testicular cancer, and kidney cancer.

The article profiles two individuals who were severely affected by this chemical - Ken Wamsley who suffers from ulcerative colitis and rectal cancer, and Sue Bailey whose son Bucky was born with multiple deformities, likely as the result of prenatal exposure to C8. While their personal narratives are terrible enough, what’s even scarier is the fact that 99.7 percent of Americans now have this chemical in their blood, and as far as scientists can determine, C8 never breaks down and is expected to remain on the planet well after humans are gone from it.

Part two of this expose will cover the lawsuits that revealed what DuPont knew about C8, information that will likely be a central pillar in the personal injury suits against DuPont that are being brought to trial in the fall.


[Source: The Intercept]