Potentially toxic chemicals found in everyday products, including fast-food wrappers, makeup and carpeting, are altering hormonal and metabolic pathways needed for human growth and development, according to a new study.
Researchers analyzed study samples from young children, teens and young adults, all of whom had a mixture of different synthetic compounds called perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances — or PFAS — in their blood, including PFOS, PFOA, PFHxS, PFNA, PFHpS and PFDA.
The US Environmental Protection Agency recently announced historic rules strictly controlling levels of several of these chemicals in the nation’s drinking water.
“Exposure to a combination of PFAS not only disrupted lipid and amino acid metabolism but also altered thyroid hormone function in the children,” said lead author Jesse Goodrich, assistant professor of population and public health sciences at the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine.
For children to properly develop, the thyroid makes two key hormones that play a role in blood pressure control and how the body makes and uses protein, fats and carbohydrates, the Mayo Clinic noted. These chemical messengers “affect every cell in the body,” according to the website.
Amino acids are needed to make enzymes, hormones, proteins and other needed molecules, while lipids control how vitamins are stored, assist in hormone production and regulate how fat is turned into energy and used or stored.
“This study is doing an in-depth analysis of how PFAS exposure is not just impacting hormone levels in humans, but impacting different metabolic pathways as well,” said David Andrews, a senior scientist at the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group that has created a national map of PFAS-contaminated sites.
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