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Zürich II Statement on Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFASs): Scientific and Regulatory Needs

DeWitt JC 1 , Glüge J 2 , Cousins IT 3 , Goldenman G 4 , Herzke D 5 , Lohmann R 6 Show all authors , Miller M 7 , Ng CA 8 , Patton S 9 , Trier X 10 , Vierke L 11 , Wang Z 12 , Adu-Kumi S 13 , Balan S 14 , Buser AM 15 , Fletcher T 16 , Haug LS 17 , Heggelund A 18 , Huang J 19 , Kaserzon S 20 , Leonel J 21 , Sheriff I 22 , Shi YL 23 , Valsecchi S 24 , Scheringer M 2

Affiliations 

  • 1 Department of Environmental and Molecular Toxicology, Oregon State University, Corvallis 97331, Oregon, United States
  • 2 Institute of Biogeochemistry and Pollutant Dynamics, ETH Zürich, Zürich CH-8092, Switzerland
  • 3 Department of Environmental Science, Stockholm University, Stockholm SE-10691, Sweden
  • 4 Milieu Consulting SPRL, Brussels 1060, Belgium
  • 5 NILU, Tromsø 9296, Norway and Department of Food Safety, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo 0213, Norway
  • 6 Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Narragansett 02882, Rhode Island, United States
  • 7 National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, U.S. Public Health Service, Research Triangle Park 27709, North Carolina, United States
  • 8 Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Environmental and Occupational Health, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh 15261, Pennsylvania, United States
  • 9 Health and Environment Program Commonweal, Bolinas 94924, California, United States
  • 10 Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, Section for Environmental Chemistry and Physics, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen 1165, Denmark
  • 11 German Environment Agency (UBA), Dessau-Roßlau 06844, Germany
  • 12 Empa-Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, St. Gallen CH-9014, Switzerland
  • 13 EnviroHealth Consulting, Accra GA184, Ghana
  • 14 California Department of Toxic Substances Control, Safer Consumer Products Program, Berkeley 94710, California, United States
  • 15 Federal Office for the Environment FOEN, Bern 3003, Switzerland
  • 16 Department of Public Health, Environments & Society, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London WC1H 9SH, U.K
  • 17 Department of Food Safety, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo 0213, Norway
  • 18 Norwegian Environment Agency, Trondheim N-7485, Norway
  • 19 School of Environment, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
  • 20 Queensland Alliance for Environmental Health Sciences, The University of Queensland, Queensland 4102, Australia
  • 21 Department of Oceanography, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianopólis 40170110, Brazil
  • 22 School of Civil Engineering, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang 14300, Malaysia
  • 23 School of Environment, Hangzhou Institute for Advanced Study, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hangzhou, CN, 310024 and State Key Laboratory of Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
  • 24 Water Research Institute-National Research Council, Brugherio 20861, Italy
Environ Sci Technol Lett, 2024 Aug 13;11(8):786-797.
PMID: 39156923 DOI: 10.1021/acs.estlett.4c00147

Abstract

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are a class of synthetic organic chemicals of global concern. A group of 36 scientists and regulators from 18 countries held a hybrid workshop in 2022 in Zürich, Switzerland. The workshop, a sequel to a previous Zürich workshop held in 2017, deliberated on progress in the last five years and discussed further needs for cooperative scientific research and regulatory action on PFASs. This review reflects discussion and insights gained during and after this workshop and summarizes key signs of progress in science and policy, ongoing critical issues to be addressed, and possible ways forward. Some key take home messages include: 1) understanding of human health effects continues to develop dramatically, 2) regulatory guidelines continue to drop, 3) better understanding of emissions and contamination levels is needed in more parts of the world, 4) analytical methods, while improving, still only cover around 50 PFASs, and 5) discussions of how to group PFASs for regulation (including subgroupings) have gathered momentum with several jurisdictions proposing restricting a large proportion of PFAS uses. It was concluded that more multi-group exchanges are needed in the future and that there should be a greater diversity of participants at future workshops.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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