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Supplemental Exposure Investigation at Select PFAS Exposure Assessment Sites

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Under Section 8006 of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018, CDC/ATSDR was required to conduct statistically based biomonitoring exposure assessments (EAs) at “no less than eight current or former domestic military installations” that have or have had documented exposures to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in drinking water. The intention of the EAs was to determine how exposure to PFAS in drinking water in communities near the military installations may have impacted levels of PFAS in serum and urine. In 2020, ATSDR entered into an Interagency Agreement (IAA) with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to conduct an exposure investigation (EI) to collect additional environmental sampling at two of the EA sites, one in Westfield MA and one in New Castle DE, to identify potential non-drinking water contributors to PFAS body burdens. The objectives of this environmental sampling EI were to evaluate: 1.       Whether PFAS were detectable in various non-drinking water environmental samples; 2.       What the detectable levels of PFAS in environmental samples were; and 3.       Whether any detectable levels of PFAS may be associated with the previously measured PFAS blood serum levels identified during the EA (i.e., the seven PFAS identified in blood serum). The EI included collecting environmental samples at the homes of some participants from these two communities.  At every home in the EI, a dust sample filtered through a small vacuum (settled dust) was collected and an exposure questionnaire was administered. In a subset of the EI homes, ATSDR/EPA collected more extensive environmental sampling.  Additional samples were collected of indoor air, household vacuum dust collected from the resident’s vacuum cleaner, wet surface wipes and soil. In addition, a silicone wristband worn by one participant per household was used to characterize PFAS exposure during daily activities.  All environmental samples collected from EI homes were analyzed for a common set of PFAS and PFAS precursors.  ATSDR/EPA also evaluated potential exposure to PFAS within the community by sampling outdoor air and locally grown produce.

Impact/Purpose

This study advances methods for sampling and measuring PFAS in the residential environment.  The analysis improves our understanding of the relative importance of PFAS exposure through drinking water versus other residential sources in impacted communities. Federal and state regulations or guidelines are not available for PFAS in any of the media that were sampled except for soil. Therefore, the results of the sampling were only intended to be used to evaluate the presence or absence, and if detected, to identify the amount of PFAS that may be present in each of the sampled media. Although the environmental PFAS sampling may assist participants in better understanding their PFAS exposure, the results will not provide discrete information about all sources of exposure, such as PFAS-contaminated food. The results of this investigation may generate new hypotheses about which potential PFAS exposure pathways may exist in these communities. The results will not be generalizable to either EA participants in the communities that were not included in the environmental sampling EI or to non-EA residents within the sampling frame. The EI is intended to allow a better understanding of PFAS exposure within each household tested.  

Citation

Scruton, K., P. Kowalski, E. Cohen-Hubal, K. Thomas, J. Minucci, R. Tchen, J. Pyon, AND J. Durant. Supplemental Exposure Investigation at Select PFAS Exposure Assessment Sites. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Washington, DC, 2024.

Download(s)

  • SUPPLEMENTAL EXPOSURE INVESTIGATION AT SELECT PFAS EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT SITES-508.PDF (PDF)  (NA  pp, 3.1 MB, about PDF)
  • https://atsdr.cdc.gov/hac/
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Last updated on February 12, 2025
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