Yale sponsoring symposium on PFAS

Chemical pollution to be subject of conference Friday

Concerns about widespread chemical pollution from PFAS compounds in drinking water, consumer products and the environment will be the focus of a major conference in New Haven on Friday sponsored by the Yale School of Public

Health.

Health scientists, state environmental officials, drinking water experts and researchers in various fields will discuss a wide variety of topics relating to PFAS — which stands for hazardous perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl compounds — that have been linked to a variety of serious health problems.

Known as “f orever chemicals” because of the way they persist in the environment and the human body, PFAS compounds have become a controversial issue in Connecticut and across the nation.

PFAS chemicals are man-made compounds created starting in the 1940s that now number more than 4,700. They have been widely used in industrial processes, firefighting foams and a broad array of consumer products because their chemical composition make them resistant to heat, water and oil.

In Connecticut, PFAS pollution hit the headlines this year as a result of major releases of firefighting foam containing these chemicals from incidents at Bradley International Airport. The chemicals flowed into the Farmington River, where a state ban on eating fish from the river continues in effect.

Hundreds of drinking water wells and systems across the U.S. have been contaminated with PFAS. A case involving pollution from a DuPont plant in West Virginia is now the subject of a major motion picture entitled “Dark Waters.”

CONNECTICUT POLITICS

— Rick Green

— Ana Radelat, CT Mirror