What's the verdict on non-stick pans?

[turbo]

OK, here are quotes from the letter accompanying the SAB report.

PFOA is a synthetic (man-made) chemical used in the manufacture of several commercially important products. PFOA has been detected in the blood of the general U.S. population although it is not fully understood how individuals are exposed to the chemical. To determine whether environmental exposure to PFOA might pose a risk to human health, EPA’s draft assessment provided an evaluation of available information on the health effects and human exposure to PFOA.

Three quarters of the Panel considered the available human biomonitoring studies
adequate to characterize environmental risk to PFOA for the general population. However, about one-quarter of the Panel believed that the available studies are inadequate for risk assessment of subpopulations possibly more highly exposed to PFOA. The scientific rationales for these viewpoints along with specific recommendations on these issues are detailed in the Panel’s report.

The letter was signed by the co-chairs of the EPA's Science Advisory Board.

If PFOA is found in the general population - even neo-natal individuals and children, how is it getting into them? It is fair to assume that the chemicals are ingested or breathed in, and since these are synthetic chemicals produced only by one company in the US, and they don't have plants all over the US to contaminate everybody's water supplies or air, PFOA must be showing up due to something ubiquitous and non-specific WRT geographic location. Cookware? Got a better idea?

 

[rewebster]

Warning: Do not, repeat, do not chew on your non-stick cookware!

 

[russ_watters]

http://www.epa.gov/sab/pdf/sab_06_006.pdf

So the worst that you could find is that the EPA says it is probably carcinagenic, but needs further study to see if any risks exist? turbo-1, that's not much of a statement. It does not support your assertions.

 

[russ_watters]

If you read the study that I linked, you'll find that PFOAs bioaccumulate in the general population, not just people who make the chemicals or employ them to make non-stick cookware. So how are men, women, and children (including infants) winding up with this stuff in their tissues? Logic tells us that the wide-spread use of non-stick cookware (about 60% of the cookware market) is a likely factor with degradation due to mechanical abuse and over-heating high on the list.

Perhaps, but virtually every industrial chemical in use is detectable in trace amounts in our water supply and blood. All that really tells us is that the tools of science are really good at measuring extremely small quantities of chemicals in our blood and water. It says nothing at all about the health risks of these exposures.

As an example of another chemical, Philadelphia's water contains roughly 60 ppb of cyanide: http://www.phila.gov/water/pdfs/WQR_2007-f.pdf

Again, tubo-1, this does nothing for your burden of proof. Your claim - and therefore your burden of proof - is that the EPA has recognized an actual health hazard that requires the phase-out of PFOA's.

The second part of your claim fails obviously at face value, since the phase-out is voluntary. And that speaks to the inaccuracy of the first part of your claim.

One more chance to substantiate or retract your claim, turbo-1. We're not going to humor this misinformation forever.

 

[Proton Soup]

Just Google on "non-stick pans" and you'll find out more than you'll ever need to know. The FDA cannot guarantee that anything is safe to use, though they can certify it as "safe" within the limits of their abilities to test.

I believe you will find that DuPont has agreed to phase out PFOA in non-stick cookware by 2015, probably though a consent agreement. If you have ever spent time on bird-enthusiast sites you should already know about the lethality of fumes from over heated non-stick cookware in our avian friends. Ever heard of the "canary in the coal mine"? Birds (probably budgies) were sometimes taken into coal mines because with their high metabolisms and small mass, they would be likely to die before the build-up of toxic gases could be very harmful to the miners.

yeah, but birds have a different physiology than we do. they can eat habaneros all day long without their eyes watering. that PFOA is one funky-looking molecule, tho. like a saturated fatty acid, but with Flourines instead of Hydrogens on the tails.

and from what i understand, the newer pots outgas a lot less of it than they used to. still, it wouldn't be much either way. i would look at it like formalin. maybe it will make you go blind if you're a biologist, but most of us will never get enough exposure to amount to jack.

 

[turbo]

So the worst that you could find is that the EPA says it is probably carcinagenic, but needs further study to see if any risks exist? turbo-1, that's not much of a statement. It does not support your assertions.

I have not been making assertions (your words). I have been quoting EPA documents. Yes, the same EPA that has been operating all through that radical leftist hippie Bush administration.

If you want to discount all their concerns, that's fine. If you want to accept all of DuPont's assertions of "safety", that's fine, too. If you want to dismiss DuPont's acceptance of an enforceable consent agreement regarding the documentation of the health effects of PFOA as "business as usual", that's fine too. If you want to dismiss DuPont's "voluntary" agreement to phase our all PFOA by 2015 without prejudice, that's just fine, too. I, for one, refuse to take the Pollyanna approach to big businesses and pretend that everything that they do is for the best, and that they are watching out for the common good. That way lies thalidomide.

 

[Proton Soup]

i'm not sure all big business is like that. when 3M found out its scotchguard was showing up in faraway places, undegraded, they took it off the market (reformulated, actually, the brand is still there).