You may not be familiar with the name, but perfluorinated compounds (PFCs), are most likely a part of your child’s daily life. You’ll find them in non-stick cookware, rainwear, upholstery, coatings on paper plates, fast food packaging, microwave popcorn bags, stain and water repellant clothing and many other products.
A new study suggests that the more exposure that children have to these chemicals the less likely they are to have a good response to vaccinations. The findings do not prove that PFCs affect the immune system, but they do suggest that the chemicals may make children more susceptible to infectious diseases.
PFCs are found around the world. Because they stay in the environment for years and years, they’ve been discovered in even remote and isolated regions.
"You can find them in polar bears," says Dr. Philippe Grandjean, the study's lead author who works at both Harvard and the University of Southern Denmark.
Studies have shown that PFCs weaken the immune system of animals. So, Dr. Grandjean wanted to know if they could effect children the same way. He and his team studied 600 kids in the Faroe Islands, located between Scotland and Iceland.
The islands were chosen because they have levels of PFCs similar to that of the U.S. Grandjean figured if the chemicals were having an effect, it would show up in the way kids' bodies responded to vaccinations.
Grandjean found that tetanus and diphtheria vaccines became much weaker in 5-year olds who had high levels of PFCs in their blood. "We found that the higher the exposure, the less capable the kids were in terms of responding appropriately to the vaccine," Grandjean says. The results raise the possibility that "the immune system is not really developing optimally."
In the last decade, government scientists have become more concerned about the possible links of PFCs to developmental problems in children. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has taken steps to begin phasing out some PFCs.
There are other chemicals found in the environment that are of more concern say Dr. Alan Ducatman from West Virginia University, which has been part of a large study of a PFC known as C8. "But they are clearly problematic." He added that the C8 study also found some evidence of an effect on the immune system.
While the exposure to PFCs may be going down in the U.S. it is ratcheting up in some other countries, like China. That becomes a problem for countries that buy products from China.
"We may just be importing products with the same compounds," he says. "So I don't think that we have solved the exposure problem yet and I think it needs international attention."
That's beginning to happen. Some global treaties are beginning to include language restricting the use of certain PFCs.
If you want to avoid many of the common products that contain PFCs, www.ewg.org offers these suggestions:
- Forgo the optional stain treatment on new carpets and furniture. Find products that haven’t been pre-treated, and if the couch you own is treated, get a cover for it.
- Choose clothing that doesn’t carry Teflon® or Scotchgard ™ tags. This includes fabric labeled stain- or water-repellent. When possible, opt for untreated cotton and wool.
- Avoid non-stick pans and kitchen utensils. Opt for stainless steel or cast iron instead.
- Cut back on greasy packaged and fast foods. These foods often come in treated wrappers.
- Use real plates instead of paper.
- Pop popcorn the old-fashioned way on the stovetop. Microwaveable popcorn bags are often coated with PFCs on the inside.
- Choose personal care products without “PTFE” or “perfluoro” in the ingredients. Use EWG’s Skin Deep at cosmeticsdatabase.com to find safer choices.
The study was published in JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Sources: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/01/24/145745691/common-chemicals-could-make-kids-vaccines-less-effective/ http://www.ewg.org/files/EWG_pfcguide.pdf
