In January 2023, the California Assembly passed Assembly Bill 1200 by a vote of 43-12 that if enacted, the law would ban PFAs (forever chemicals) from food packaging, such as paper, paperboard or plant-based food packaging and serve ware, as well as mandatory labels and publishing on public platforms for any products that do contain PFAs, products like non-stick coating cookware. If this bill gets enacted, California will become the fourth state to prohibit PFAS from food packaging, joining Maine who passed the bill in 2022, New York in 2022, and Washington in 2018 – 2019. “The National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2020 also bans the use of PFAS in food packaging for military meals after October 1. The bill also prohibits cookware companies from making false marketing claims implying that products are PFAS-free.”
Assembly member Ting states, “Federal regulations on PFAS allow companies to self-certify that a chemical used in their food packaging is safe, – That’s not good enough for me – not when our health and environment suffer the consequences. Manufacturers should use safer alternatives so that our families aren’t ingesting harmful chemicals.”
Bill would also ban false ‘PFAS-free’ marketing claims
Senior Advocate, California Government Affairs Susan Little also states,
“Because of a broken federal chemical regulatory system, states are stepping up to protect the health of its citizens
from hazardous chemicals added to food packaging, – the Environmental Working Group’s senior
advocate for California government affairs. This law will protect Californians by reducing their exposure to PFAS in food.”
“PFAS are also used in nonstick coatings for cookware and bakeware, and are released into air when the pots, pans and baking sheets reach high temperatures,” Little explained. “Products that claim to be produced without PFOA, the PFAS chemical that once was used to make DuPont’s Teflon, are often coated with another form of PFAS. This bill also prevents companies from claiming a product is free of PFOA if another chemical in the same family is present.”
As you have probably learned down the road, PFAs are known to have many health problems and even cancers linked to it through indigestion. It has been learned recently that this forever chemical can reduce the effectiveness of vaccines, adding to the many scares this persistent chemical causes. “Food is a major source of exposure to PFAS, and there is no reason these chemicals should be in packaging,” said David Andrews, Ph.D., a senior scientist at EWG. “In addition to PFAS leaching from food packaging into food, it can accumulate in fish and meat, and farmers may inadvertently contaminate their crops with PFAS when irrigating with contaminated groundwater or from using contaminated compost.”
2017 was an active year for discoveries and tests involving PFAs. A report from the Environmental Working Group (EWG), an American activist group that specializes in research and advocacy in the areas of agricultural subsidies, toxic chemicals, drinking water pollutants, and corporate accountability, highlighted that most fast food business have been continuing to utilize packaging with PFAs, despite health concerns from such materials having been known for over ten years. Scientists from groups like EWG, worked together to collect and perform tests on 327 samples of materials used to serve food to customers, resulting in 40% testing positive for fluorine. Fluorine is the lightest halogen and exists at standard conditions as a highly toxic, pale yellow diatomic gas, and is also an indicator for PFAS. The full study findings were published in a peer-reviewed manuscript by the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters.
In November of the same year, “two of the most notorious PFAS chemicals – PFOA, the Teflon chemical, and PFOS, formerly an ingredient in 3M’s Scotchgard, were added to California’s Proposition 65 registry of chemicals known to the state to cause reproductive toxicity. Inclusion on the registry means products that may expose consumers to PFOA or PFOS must carry warnings.”
Knowing all of these terrifying facts about PFAs and now even fast food packaging becoming harmful for us, it’s best to start taking our health regarding what we’re eating into our own hands. Using the correct tools to prepare our meals is one of the best methods to limiting our PFAs intake to very little. Tools like stainless steel cookware will help us not only know that we’ll have a life long helping hand to prepare our food, but will eliminate forever chemicals from cheap non-stick coating pots and pans, fast food packaging, and the contaminated water slowly from our system.
“California Assembly Approves Bill to Ban Toxic ‘Forever Chemicals’ from Food Packaging.” Environmental Working Group, 17 Jan. 2023, https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news-release/california-assembly-approves-bill-ban-toxic-forever-chemicals-food.
“Environmental Working Group.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 1 Feb. 2023, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_Working_Group.
