It's a case of a beauty turning into a beast, and a story somewhat reminiscent of the still lingering asbestos crisis.
Perfluorinated chemicals are a class of man-made compounds that were widely used because of their resistance to degradation. But precisely this characteristic, and the potential harm they may cause in humans, makes them now an emerging environmental problem.
Also known as per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances or just PFAS, the compounds are present in hundreds of products, such as in the stain protection of carpets, and as components of non-stick cookware and insecticides.
Since the 1950s they were commonly used in firefighting foams due to their resistance to heat and their capacity to form films in water, and so applied across emergency and training sites around the world, including Australia.
Unfortunately, not only are they persistent, they also have a high mobility in water, and so they dispersed and accumulated in the environment. According to the CRC Care website, almost every person on Earth has PFAS compounds now in their blood.
Studies from Europe and the US indicate food and water are the main sources of ingestion, but dust ingestion, and hand-to-mouth transfer from mill-treated carpets also play a role.
The human body cannot break down these chemicals, and there is growing concern that they could be harmful, although a clear risk for human health is yet to be established.
The growing concerns led Queensland and South Australian governments take action. In 2017, the states banned the use of firefighting foams containing certain PFAS types implicated in causing disease.
Across other parts of Australia their manufacture is now also prohibited, but it is still legal to use the foam from existing stockpiles.
This reflects that the risk for human health is still assessed at the precautionary level, and different government's respond in different ways.
The Australian Government's health website mentions that these chemicals have been shown to be toxic to fish, but that there is currently no consistent evidence that exposure to PFAS causes adverse human health effects.
But the US Government's Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry is more forthright. While it acknowledges that the bulk of studies were done in animals, "and not all effects in animals may occur in animals", the site raises awareness to a range of potential adverse effects to human health at high levels of exposure. These include:
Most concerning is that PFAS may also increase the risk for some cancers such as kidney cancer and testicular cancer. Studies done in this area are not yet conclusive, but the International Agency for Research on Cancer has classified certain commonly used PFAS as possibly carcinogenic (causing cancer) to humans, and the US Environmental Protection Agency says there is evidence that PFAs may have the potential to cause cancer.
In a 2017 paper in Environmental Health, a group of 37 US scientists, public health officials and physicians published a call for a coordinated research effort, referring to six million Americans being exposed to PFAS through their drinking water at concentrations of concern.
"A coordinated program of exposure analysis, biomonitoring, health studies, and medical monitoring should help regulators set appropriate health advisory levels and contribute to preventing similar future contamination, both in the US and internationally," the authors write."
The Australian Government is slowly waking up to a problem that is also emerging in Australia, in parts triggered by a 2018 Inquiry into the management of PFAS contamination in and around Defence bases.
Administered by the ARC, the first round of the Special Research Initiative awarded grants totalling $8.2 million to a diverse range of 9 projects that will address the remediation of PFAS contaminated sites. They include:
In the 2017-18 Budget it announced a $12.5 million over four years national research program into the human health effects of PFAS to increase the evidence base around potential risks to humans from prolonged exposure to PFAS.
In addition, a $13 million PFAS remediation Research Program was launched to investigate and remediate contaminated areas, including soil and other solid contaminated debris, groundwater, waterways and marine systems.
The Government says that it is investing more than $120 million in responding to PFAS contamination, including investigations, community support, remediation and research.
Indeed, it's early days in what may become a crisis but is not a crisis yet. It's worth remembering, though, that so was asbestos not that long ago, and that story is still one where Australian government's have left the public largely alone to deal with the problem - banned in 2003, it is estimated that around one third of buildings in Australia still contain asbestos products.
As the Australian asbestos network notes: "The risk of asbestos-related disease, once thought to be confined to a small number of workplaces, has spread throughout society. This elevated risk will remain until all asbestos-containing materials have been removed from the built environment."
No sign for that happening any time soon, and meanwhile the next man-made darling is about to show its ugly side.