A PANEL of scientists advising the Government on how it deals with a group of ‘forever chemicals’ linked to kidney cancer, immune disorders and infertility, say they are “anxiously waiting” for news of when an Islandwide blood testing programme will begin.
An independent Scientific Advisory Panel was established by ministers in 2023 to help guide policy on PFAS – a group of manmade chemicals developed because of their ability to repel heat, fuel and water but have since been linked to several serious health conditions.
Called ‘forever chemicals’ because of their inability to break down naturally, PFAS are now present in western countries, including Jersey.
A particular type, called PFOS, was an ingredient in firefighting foam sprayed at the Airport for many years until the early 1990s, which has now contaminated streams, groundwater and boreholes.
The panel – chaired by public health expert Dr Steve Hajioff, with epidemiologist Dr Tony Fletcher and environmental chemist Prof Ian Cousins – has produced four reports so far advising the government on action, the last one published in draft form last week and the subject of a public meeting last week.
There, the panel made a “call for clarity” to the government, urging it to act on the only recommendation, out of many, that it had made twice – in its first and third reports.
This is for islandwide blood testing so the panel can assess the ‘background levels’ of PFAS in the wider community, and not just around the St Ouen’s Bay and Pont Marquet areas, which have been linked to the Airport contamination.
Dr Hajioff said: “We do think getting that Islandwide data is important. Tony [Dr Fletcher] has looked at PFAS levels in drinking water and modelled levels across Jersey, but we need to data on levels in humans – it is one reason why we have not made any geographical recommendations so far.”
Dr Fletcher added: “We have been told it is happening ‘soon’ and we are anxiously waiting to get an answer.”
In response to the panel’s call, a spokesperson from Public Health told the JEP: “This was one of the recommendations in the PFAS Scientific Advisory Panel’s Report Three, which considered further blood testing and interventions to lower PFAS levels in blood for Islanders affected by the hotspot area.
“The government’s Water Quality and Safety Board is currently considering the report’s recommendations and will announce future action in due course.”
The fourth of the panel’s thematic reports is split into three, with last week being the interim results of the first part, on the treatment of drinking water.
A principal recommendation is that mains water should be treated to achieve a level of four nanograms per litre for the combined total of four PFAS, including PFOS and PFOA, which both found in Jersey, within five years.
Jersey Water has agreed to meet this target. The current level in drinking water is around 13 nanograms per litre, significantly less than when the utility was abstracting water from contaminated boreholes in St Ouen’s Bay.
The four nanogram limit is among the lowest levels internationally, and is broadly similar to the United States, which has also set a level of four nanograms, but just for PFOS and PFOA.
One member of the public at the meeting, former senior St Ouen’s Bay lifeguard Paul Berghouse, asked why the panel was not following the US Environmental Protection Agency’s maximum contamination level of 0 nanograms.
Dr Fletcher said that they had considered it, but the panel wanted to set a level that was as low as reasonably practical rather than an ideal but unrealistic target.
The second part of the panel’s fourth report will focus on PFAS in food, sludge and slurry and boreholes. The panel said that 80 per cent of PFAS in the human body enters through ingesting food.
The panel said that it would like to hear from any Islander who has experience of treating borehole water to reduce PFAS, the use of borehole water in irrigation, and the use of biosolids, such as spreading slurry, in farming.
The email to contribute is pfaspanel@gov.je.
