The DDT of this generation is contaminating water all over the US and Australia

[phands]

Rather scary substances.....

PFAS chemicals have been linked to a range of health risks including cancer, immune-system issues, and developmental problems in fetuses. Communities in states as far-flung as West Virginia, New York, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin have already dealt with water-contamination emergencies from the chemicals. The crisis isn’t contained to the US; at least 90 sites across Australia are contaminated with PFAS, mostly due to use of firefighting foam, and reports emerged last month that new PFAS contamination sites were identified in Western Australia.
Outside of affected communities, PFAS is still little-known. But that is no accident; for years, the US government and industry leaders obscured and downplayed evidence of the compounds’ harm and ubiquity in the environment. For example, Sharon Lerner at the Intercept recently reported that 3M, makers of Scotchguard and firefighting foam made from PFOS and PFOA, knew by the 1970s that the compounds were harmful to people’s health and accumulating in people’s blood, and yet continued manufacturing the compounds and withheld the information from the US Environmental Protection Agency until turning over documents and ceasing production in 2000. In turn, EPA fined 3M $1.5 million for violating toxic-substance regulations, yet did nothing further to stop the spread of PFAS in the environment.
It has still not enacted any rule to regulate the compounds. Under the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974, the EPA is responsible for determining when a chemical needs to be regulated in the US water supply. Despite tens of thousands of new chemicals arriving on the market, the EPA hasn’t added a new toxin to its list since 1996. (Even the Government Office of Accountability thinks that’s a sign of a broken system.)
But the news around PFAS is reaching a critical mass that is impossible to ignore.

Much more at https://qz.com/1381593/the-ddt-of-t...minating-water-all-over-the-us-and-australia/