4 ms·

Is "forever" chemicals a stupid name for these things? I've seen a few different articles about how these things can be decomposed. I guess it's "forever" becau

Is "forever" chemicals a stupid name for these things? I've seen a few different articles about how these things can be decomposed. I guess it's "forever" because there are no know "natural" processes that break these things down ?

iNerdier 2y ago
It’s a shorthand for news articles intended for laypeople but it gets the point across; no natural processes yet found break down these compounds and in small but measurable quantities they build up in our environment. It’s not practical to say, treat all sewage effluent or refuse going to recycling / landfill / incineration to break them down so they build up and we don’t really know what they will end up doing. So for most practical purposes, yes they’re not going anywhere.
zdragnar 2y ago
As with plastics, they are forever in only a hyperbolic sense. However, there are few, if any, biological processes that decompose them, and they are quite stable even in rough environments like direct sunlight and ocean water. On the timelines that they are stable, the risk is that they will enter the food chain bioaccumulation will poison everything.
- bamboozled 2y ago
  Pretty shitty really, I absolutely hate they we have done stuff like this.
- OutOfHere 2y ago
  It's not merely a risk; it's already materialized. They already have entered the food chain. Almost all Americans have it in their blood. They already have poisoned everything. They're a part of sewage that is used to fertilize fields and livestock. They're even used in pesticides now, intentionally sprayed on food.
  - bamboozled 2y ago
    I saw a report where condoms have high amount of PFAs in them, like wtf? The chemicals are probably used in condoms to help latex repel moisture and liquid. [1] This is where trust in intuitions is breaking down in my opinion, all through high school it's "always wear a condom", which is yes, good advice, but now it turns out your condom was poisoning you and your partner ? Penis and vagina skin is thin and the organs have a high level of blood vessels, which makes them particularly dangerous organs to expose to PFAS, Linda Birnbaum, a science adviser for Mamavation who previously ran the Environmental Protection Agency’s toxicology program, wrote in the report. “The vagina and penis are incredibly vascular areas and dermal exposure to these areas are often higher than other places of the body,” Birnbaum said. How these products were allowed to proliferate literally everywhere with so little oversight is absolutely crazy to me. I have seen fire fighters discharge this stuff into rivers for "training". The river is now closed for swimming due to dangerous levels of chemicals. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/28/condoms-pfas-forever-chemicals https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/28/...
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - OutOfHere 2y ago
      https://www.mamavation.com/health/condoms-lubricants-pfas-forever-chemicals.html https://www.mamavation.com/health/condoms-lubricants-pfas-fo...
    - actionfromafar 2y ago
      As kids we used to play in the (presumably PFAS) foam the firefighters filled a meadow with during county fairs. It was fun.
    - ImHereToVote 2y ago
      Corporations have a fiduciary duty to poison us. What are you? A communist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co.
throwup238 2y ago
The term of art is “persistent organic pollutants” which I think falls on the diametric opposite end of the spectrum: it’s far too clinical to covey any information to laymen. “Forever chemicals” at least somewhat conveys the core problem to the masses.
- kragen 2y ago
  taken literally, though, 'forever chemicals' would seem to apply equally well to helium, neon, xenon, zircon, alumina, and maybe silica silica could even be described as a 'carcinogenic forever chemical'. inhaling silica dust is almost certainly worse for you than inhaling teflon dust. should people who want to avoid forever chemicals move someplace without naturally occurring silica? to the extent that they're actually 'forever' they're pretty inert and not much of a problem. the likely pollution problem is not teflon (though maybe it behaves differently as nanoparticles) but the much less inert species like pfoa, which have significant toxicity precisely because they're less stable

iNerdier 2y ago

It’s a shorthand for news articles intended for laypeople but it gets the point across; no natural processes yet found break down these compounds and in small but measurable quantities they build up in our environment. It’s not practical to say, treat all sewage effluent or refuse going to recycling / landfill / incineration to break them down so they build up and we don’t really know what they will end up doing. So for most practical purposes, yes they’re not going anywhere.

zdragnar 2y ago

As with plastics, they are forever in only a hyperbolic sense. However, there are few, if any, biological processes that decompose them, and they are quite stable even in rough environments like direct sunlight and ocean water. On the timelines that they are stable, the risk is that they will enter the food chain bioaccumulation will poison everything.

bamboozled 2y ago
Pretty shitty really, I absolutely hate they we have done stuff like this.
OutOfHere 2y ago
It's not merely a risk; it's already materialized. They already have entered the food chain. Almost all Americans have it in their blood. They already have poisoned everything. They're a part of sewage that is used to fertilize fields and livestock. They're even used in pesticides now, intentionally sprayed on food.
- bamboozled 2y ago
  I saw a report where condoms have high amount of PFAs in them, like wtf? The chemicals are probably used in condoms to help latex repel moisture and liquid. [1] This is where trust in intuitions is breaking down in my opinion, all through high school it's "always wear a condom", which is yes, good advice, but now it turns out your condom was poisoning you and your partner ? Penis and vagina skin is thin and the organs have a high level of blood vessels, which makes them particularly dangerous organs to expose to PFAS, Linda Birnbaum, a science adviser for Mamavation who previously ran the Environmental Protection Agency’s toxicology program, wrote in the report. “The vagina and penis are incredibly vascular areas and dermal exposure to these areas are often higher than other places of the body,” Birnbaum said. How these products were allowed to proliferate literally everywhere with so little oversight is absolutely crazy to me. I have seen fire fighters discharge this stuff into rivers for "training". The river is now closed for swimming due to dangerous levels of chemicals. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/28/condoms-pfas-forever-chemicals https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/28/...
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - OutOfHere 2y ago
    https://www.mamavation.com/health/condoms-lubricants-pfas-forever-chemicals.html https://www.mamavation.com/health/condoms-lubricants-pfas-fo...
  - actionfromafar 2y ago
    As kids we used to play in the (presumably PFAS) foam the firefighters filled a meadow with during county fairs. It was fun.
  - ImHereToVote 2y ago
    Corporations have a fiduciary duty to poison us. What are you? A communist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co.

throwup238 2y ago

The term of art is “persistent organic pollutants” which I think falls on the diametric opposite end of the spectrum: it’s far too clinical to covey any information to laymen. “Forever chemicals” at least somewhat conveys the core problem to the masses.

kragen 2y ago
taken literally, though, 'forever chemicals' would seem to apply equally well to helium, neon, xenon, zircon, alumina, and maybe silica silica could even be described as a 'carcinogenic forever chemical'. inhaling silica dust is almost certainly worse for you than inhaling teflon dust. should people who want to avoid forever chemicals move someplace without naturally occurring silica? to the extent that they're actually 'forever' they're pretty inert and not much of a problem. the likely pollution problem is not teflon (though maybe it behaves differently as nanoparticles) but the much less inert species like pfoa, which have significant toxicity precisely because they're less stable