High Levels of PFAS in Wild Freshwater Fish

By Bobby Bascomb | Living on Earth | February 17, 2023

Read the full article by Bobby Bascomb (Living on Earth)

"Per and polyfluorinated substances commonly called PFAS are chemicals commonly used in everything from fast food wrappers and cookware to firefighting foam and carpeting. Decades of research indicates that PFAS are harmful to human health, with risks ranging from cancers to reproductive disorders to immune function disruption. And a recent study published in Environmental News, showed that wild-caught, American freshwater fish are often loaded with PFAS. Living on Earth’s Bobby Bascomb spoke with David Andrews, a senior scientist with the Environmental Working Group.

ANDREWS: So this is a study where we were looking for how are people being exposed to these chemicals. We know there's health concerns at very low concentrations. There have been a number of scientific studies that have shown that people who eat more fish have slightly higher levels of PFAS in their serum. But we wanted to kind of dive in and see what's the picture look like across the United States. Actually, we were very surprised to find that there were publicly available data sets. This is testing that had been conducted by the US Environmental Protection Agency, the most recent data was 2013 to 2015. But they actually took a random sample of streams and rivers across the country trying to get a representative sample of PFAS levels in freshwater fish across the country. And then there is also another set of data that — collected by the agency — where they sampled across the whole U.S. shoreline of the Great Lakes. So they're these two great data sets, they're actually 500 different sample locations. And these are fish that are important to anglers. And so this huge data set was something that we looked at in terms of how much PFAS are in these fish. And the results were really quite striking. compared to any other source of PFAS exposure. The levels in these fish are incredibly high and in the 10s of 1000S of parts per trillion."