110 Of 117 UK Bodies Of Water Tested Revealed PFAS Contamination Above Proposed Safety Level

[OKIsItJustMe]

1. "... at least five times higher ..."

That sort of wording always catches my attention.
https://www.wcl.org.uk/action-on-forever-chemicals-to-prevent-a-forever-problem.asp

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The launch coincides with the publication of new analysis of official Environment Agency data, which reveals an increase in harmful PFAS pollution in rivers across England in the last two years. The new analysis by the Rivers Trust and Wildlife and Countryside Link reveals that:

• PFAS pollution detection rates in rivers is consistently high with an apparent increase in the last two years.
• 94% of English rivers where forever chemicals have been tested for in combination (110 out of 117 sites in the last 6 years) would fail proposed new EU safety standards for PFAS in surface water. This is up from 77% (81 out of 105) of river sites where PFAS combinations were found in data analysed in February 2023.
• 85% of these river sites where PFAS combinations were found exceed proposed EU safety levels by at least 5 times the recommended limit. With almost half (47%) at 10 times or more the proposed threshold.
• Slight increase in limits detected in freshwater fish: Levels of just one toxic PFAS forever chemical – Perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) in English freshwater fish have also risen. With levels on average 322 times higher than proposed new EU safe levels for wildlife, an increase from 301 times the proposed threshold which was detected in 2023. If just one portion of these freshwater fish were eaten per month this would exceed the safe threshold of PFOS for people to consume over a year

In the last week environment groups, co-ordinated by the Marine Conservation Society, have also written to ministers urging a ban on all PFAS in consumer products and a commitment to a clear timeline for phasing them out across all other uses. And in the first ever research on the presence of the highly persistent and mobile PFAS Trifluoroacetic Acid (TFA) in UK rivers, Fidra revealed that 98% of river sites tested were contaminated, with one site in Glasgow recording the second highest level of TFA ever documented globally.

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