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PORTSMOUTH — A state Department of Environmental Services official listed a number of health effects — including cancer

Portsmouth Herald - 3/18/2017

PORTSMOUTH — A state Department of Environmental Services official listed a number of health effects — including cancer — he says are associated with exposure to PFOS and PFOA in drinking water.

Dennis Pinski, health risk assessment supervisor for DES, referenced the Environmental Protection Agency’s setting of a health advisory on exposure to the PFCs. The statement comes in contrast to past comments by state health officials and is being hailed as a big step forward by a local lawmaker who has been fighting water contamination.

Pinski stated in a memo dated March 13 that the EPA provided “information on the adverse health effects associated with ingestion of these chemicals in drinking water,” while setting the combined health advisory for PFOS and PFOA in water at 70 parts per trillion.

“Scientific studies have shown exposure to PFOA and PFOS in drinking water to be associated with … developmental effects, decreased bone formation, accelerated puberty in males, reduced newborn body weight, liver toxicity, thyroid effects, immune system effects (and) cancer,” Pinski states in the memo.

Pinski further states the “EPA determined that there is ‘suggestive evidence of carcinogenic potential’ for both PFOA and PFOS under EPAs 2005 Guidelines for Carcinogen Risk Assessment.”

“Although EPA has judged that the evidence for cancer in humans and animals from PFOS exposure is limited, the evidence for cancer from PFOA exposure is stronger,” Pinski said. “Human studies suggest that PFOA exposure could lead to increased risk for kidney and testicular cancer. Animal studies have indicated that PFOA exposure could result in increased risk of liver, testicular and pancreatic tumors.”

Pinski’s statements in the memo come in stark contrast to those made consistently over the last several years by State Epidemiologist Dr. Benjamin Chan. In an interview with the Portsmouth Herald in January, Chan said, "we don't know if PFCs cause any health effects for humans."

Jake Leon, a spokesman for DHHS, said “the department’s statements regarding the potential health impacts from PFC exposure are consistent with guidance from the EPA and ATSDR.”

“While studies in humans do not consistently or conclusively show that PFCs cause any specific health effects, they suggest there are associations between PFCs and various health outcomes,” Leon said in a statement Friday. “Because these results are not conclusive or consistent, additional research is needed to determine whether specific health effects are caused by PFC exposure.”

The city of Portsmouth closed the Haven well at Pease International Tradeport in May 2014 after the Air Force found levels of perfluorooctane sulfonic acid, or PFOS, 12.5 times higher than what was then the EPA's provisional health advisory. The EPA has since dramatically lowered its lifetime health advisory to 70 ppt. The EPA has classified PFOS and perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, as "contaminants of emerging concern” because of their potential harm to humans. PFOS and PFOA are a class of perfluorochemicals.

State Rep. Mindi Messmer, D-Rye, called Pinski’s memo “a step in the right direction.” She credited DES with “finally acknowledging the evidence-based science that supports health effects from exposures to PFCs of just 50 parts per trillion.”

“The people at Pease were exposed to much higher concentrations and we know now that the result is they have very high levels of PFCs in their blood, especially children,” Messmer said Friday.

Messmer, who chairs a subcommittee of a task force focused on the Seacoast Pediatric Cancer Cluster, has called for the Coakley Landfill Group to provide municipal water to people living around the Superfund cleanup site in North Hampton and Rye. PFCs have been found in monitoring wells and in surface water at levels dramatically higher than the health advisory level and below the level in private residential wells.

Messmer renewed her call for the CLG to provide municipal water to homes around the landfill so private residential wells are not contaminated.

“We couldn’t prevent what happened at Pease, but we can prevent the same thing happening at Coakley,” Messmer said. “We have the power to prevent it.”

The CLG includes Portsmouth, North Hampton, Newington and several private companies, mostly trash haulers and generators, according to Portsmouth City Attorney Robert Sullivan, who serves on the group’s executive committee. Sullivan declined to comment on Pinski’s memo on Friday, saying he had not seen it.

“I will forward it on the Coakley Landfill Group,” he said.

The town of Greenland had asked the CLG to provide municipal water to residents, but the group declined. Greenland then followed that up with another letter asking the group to reconsider its decision. Sullivan acknowledged the group likely will not respond to the second request.

“The position of the landfill group was expressed to the town in the first letter,” Sullivan said.