Testing done by ADEM, Butler said, also didn’t assess water samples taken from sites closest to the dump. And while PFAS compounds are actually common, he said, experts have concluded that elevated levels within the human body could be a warranted health concern.
At this month’s meeting, many residents agreed with Butler, expressing a insecurity that ADEM—or any government officials—are looking for residents in and across the Moody site.
Courtesy of Lee Hedgepeth/Inside Climate News
Jeff Wickliffe, chair of the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Department of Environmental Health Sciences, told those gathered that he believes more data is required to completely understand what impacts the location could have had on those living nearby.
Because there are not any natural sources of without end chemicals, Wickliffe said, it’s difficult to imagine claims that only vegetative material was burned at the location given the degrees present within the water. Other waste was likely present, he argued, to be able to produce the degrees of PFAS compounds present in discharge from the Moody site.
Questions across the source of PFAS in residents’ blood, if present, could be addressed by taking background measurements of people who weren’t exposed to the impacts of the fireplace and resulting pollution, for instance, Wickliffe said.
Testing residents’ blood or urine for the presence of such compounds, then, may allow locals to document at the very least one avenue of potential impacts from the Moody site on their health, he said.
According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), increases in exposure to PFAS compounds can increase cholesterol, decrease birth weight, lower antibody responses to vaccines, and increase risks of pregnancy-induced hypertension, preeclampsia, and kidney and testicular cancer.
The risk of health impacts from PFAS is decided by exposure aspects like dose, frequency, and duration, in addition to individual aspects like sensitivity or disease burden, in keeping with the federal agency.
