WASHINGTON -- The Environmental Protection Agency, answering a complaint from an environmental advocacy group, said it will investigate whether chemical maker DuPont Co. withheld an internal study that showed health risks from an unregulated chemical used to make Teflon.
EPA spokesman Joe Martyak said the agency will investigate the complaint from the Washington, D.C.-based Environmental Working Group and will take whatever action is appropriate if problems are found.
The advocacy group released a one-page study from 1981, which it said was obtained from public records of a class-action lawsuit against the Wilmington, Del., company. The group said the study was not turned over to the EPA as it should have been.
Residents living near DuPont's Parkersburg, W.Va., plant brought the suit, which contended their drinking water was contaminated by the chemical perfluorooctanoic acid and its salts, more commonly known as PFOA or C-8.
"We suspect, but cannot prove at this point, that DuPont has been deliberately withholding this information in order to avoid EPA action against PFOA and its highly profitable Teflon product line," said Jane Houlihan, EWG's vice president of research.
"This constitutes a serious violation of a federal law that requires companies to report immediately any evidence they uncover that a chemical may pose a substantial health risk," she said.
DuPont said the document did not meet federal requirements for reporting the EPA. The company described the document as an informal recording in the early 1980s of levels of PFOA in blood samples from eight women who worked in or near the plant and had recently given birth.
The company said the document showed that one woman had a 4-month-old with a confirmed birth defect in a nostril and eye. The document also noted another woman had a 2-year-old with an unconfirmed birth defect in an eye and tear duct.
"There is no evidence or data that demonstrates PFOA causes adverse human health effects, including developmental or reproductive effects, in any segment of the human population," said Robert Rickard, who runs a DuPont health and environmental sciences lab.
The EPA plans to release a preliminary study Monday of the risks of PFOA. The study is based on tests with laboratory animals and reviews of health screening of workers who handled the chemical, which is released into water and air during the manufacturing process.
|
If
you have come to this page from an outside location click
here to get back to mindfully.org |