Safety Concerns May Stick to Teflon

KTVU 2 San Francisco Bay, Staff
Published February 14, 2006

BERKELEY -- Michele Hammond is a UC Berkeley ecologist and the mother of two young children. She says she quit cooking with non-stick pans out of concern that when heated the Teflon coating might emit some sort of toxic chemical. "I use cast iron pans -- which I was actually surprised [to find] are not that expensive. And it's not that hard. It's a little less convenient maybe," says Hammond. For a half century now, DuPont's non-stick Teflon pot and pan coating has made cooking easier for tens of millions of American families. But in recent months, a huge controversy has emerged over whether a chemical called PFOA. which is used to manufacture teflon, causes cancer and other health problems. The same class of chemical is used in the manufacture of most all non-stick cookware, as well as water and grease resistant fabrics, coatings for popcorn bags, French fry containers, candy bars wrappers and pizza boxes. DuPont counters that such products have only trace amounts or no PFOA left in them. "The important thing to note is that no human health effects are known from exposure to PFOA," says DuPont executive David Boothe. But some scientists -- including a panel advising the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency -- is investigating whether PFOA might cause health problems and possibly should be listed as a carcinogen. Currently, there is no established safe or unsafe level of exposure to PFOA. "Now is the time to [test PFOA] to assure that we don't get to levels in the environment where we would have a concern," explains U.S. Environmental Protection Agency principal deputy administrator Susan Hazen. According to Hazen, about six years ago the agency learned that about 95% of all Americans already have small levels of PFOA in their blood. "We also had access to information about an animal study where animal dosed at extremely high does -- much higher than we would see in the general public -- experienced some adverse effects that were of concern to us," says Hazen "The peer-reviewed science also shows that human beings do not react in the same way as rats or other animals to exposure to PFOA," defends DuPont's Boothe. The Environmental Working Group, a national non-profit health advocacy organization, disagrees. "It shows all the markers of other chemicals that they have studied and know to be carcinogens," counters Bill Walker of the EWG. If cookware is overheated, it will emit toxic gases. DuPont says that pan must be heated to over more than 600 degrees -- way above normal cooking levels. The Environmental Working Group disagrees on this point as well. "These gases do start to come off of Teflon pans when they're heated to a much lower temperature than DuPont's says," claims Walker. While DuPont asserts that a large body of peer-reviewed science and at least three individual government agencies back up the corporation's claim that Teflon and PFOA are safe for people to use, the company his agreed to phase out 95% of its use of the chemical in the next three years and eliminate it entirely by 2015. According to the Environmental Working Group's Walker, a corporation does not go through the costly process of eliminate a chemical form its manufacturing process without some legal concerns. DuPont also agreed to pay a $16 million settlement for allegedly withholding information about potential environmental and health risks near its factory associated with PFOA. "It was basically a record-keeping or administrative dispute that was settled in December," according to Boothe. Lately, DuPont has been defending Teflon including running full page ads in major newspapers, but aware consumers like Michele Hammond say they won't have any faith in such campaigns until an independent testing group offers evidence that such claims of safety are valid. "Until some independent evidence arises, the EPA doesn't even have the authority to order ... say DuPont ... to do tests on these things," says Walker. That evidence -- in the form of an EPA science advisory panel report -- could come as early as this week. "We believe a lot of science has come out since they began the report that really informs the decision and really should be looked at for a final judgement," says DuPont's Boothe. Currently, the EPA is not raising red flags when Teflon and related products are used properly. The agency's official position is that there is no reason "...for consumers to stop using any consumer or industrial related products that contain PFOA. That position may change, and -- as with many things in Washington -- the change could come quickly once the advisory panel report is made public.