About 30% of the people tested in Osaka, Japan, had abnormal blood tests.

After a groundwater in Settsu City, Osaka Prefecture, Japan, was detected to contain organofluorine compounds more than 400 times over the limit, local civil society organizations organized blood tests for more than 1,000 residents in the vicinity. The newly released survey results show that about 30% of the tested people have excessive levels of perfluorinated and polyfluoroalkyl substances in their blood.

Perfluoro and polyfluoroalkyl substances are difficult to degrade and accumulate in the environment and the human body, and are known as “permanent chemicals”. 2023, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), an agency of the World Health Organization, classified one of the representative substances, perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), as carcinogenic, and the other as a probable carcinogen, perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS). (PFOS) as a possible carcinogen.

The results of a water-quality survey last year showed that the level of organofluorine compounds in groundwater at a site in Settsu City, Osaka Prefecture, was 420 times Japan’s provisional national standard. After more than 30 residents in the neighborhood were found to have abnormal blood tests late last year, a civic group decided to expand the scope of the test to more than 1,000 residents.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)