Sweden's Mothers and the PFAS Challenge

In Sweden, a big problem has been the presence of harmful chemicals called PFAS in drinking water. These chemicals are tough to break down and can cause health issues. A study looked at blood samples from first-time moms in Uppsala from 1996 to 2022. The goal was to see if efforts to clean up the water have helped reduce the amount of PFAS in these moms. The study found that some PFAS levels have gone down over time. This is likely because of international rules that have limited the use of these chemicals. However, other PFAS levels first went up and then started to decrease. This is probably because of later rules that restricted their use. Drinking water was a big source of PFAS early on. After cleanup efforts around 2012, levels of some PFAS in the blood went down. But even after the cleanup, drinking water still seems to be a source of some PFAS. Eating fish and seafood also seems to be a significant source of PFAS exposure. Overall, PFAS levels in first-time moms have gone down. This has led to fewer moms having levels above what is considered safe by the European Food Safety Authority. But even so, more than half of the moms sampled from 2018 to 2022 still had levels above this safe limit. This shows that more needs to be done to reduce PFAS exposure.