Now We Need to Worry About Harmful ‘ Forever Chemicals ’ in Our Toilet Paper Too

In case you’re counting, the average American will go through 26 kg (57 lbs) of toilet paper in a single year. Multiply that by the 332 million people in the U.S. and you get more than 19 billion pounds of waste paper being flushed away annually. All by itself that represents a massive disposal and sanitation challenge. But now, according to a paper just published in Environmental Science & Technology Letters there’s even more reason to be concerned: All of that toilet paper, including major brands sold around the world, turn out to be yet another source of PFAS, short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. Also known as “forever chemicals,” these ubiquitous manufacturing chemicals have been linked by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to a range of health ills, including, decreased fertility, hypertension in pregnant people, increased risk of certain cancers, developmental delays in children, low birthweight, hormonal irregularities, elevated cholesterol, reduced effectiveness of the immune system—leading to decreased efficacy of vaccines—and more. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] PFAS are found pretty much everywhere: in soaps, shampoos, cleaning products, clothing, food packaging, plastics, firefighting foam, carpeting and, as recent studies have revealed, in menstrual products, including tampons, pads, and period underwear. The chemicals contaminate the soil surrounding manufacturing plants and have been ...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized embargoed study Environmental Health healthscienceclimate Source Type: news