The inquiry into the per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals,also known as PFAS,will be chaired by Victorian senator Lidia Thorpe,who described them as the “asbestos of the 21st century,just far more prevalent and far less understood”.
“These chemicals already affect every single person in the world,yet not enough is being done to manage our exposure to them and reduce the risks,” she said.
“We’ve already seen worrying instances of cancer clusters with suspected links to PFAS chemicals. We cannot take them seriously enough.”
A years-long documentary investigation by this masthead, iKandy Films,and Stan has unearthed devastating levels of sickness and death in an Aboriginal community on the NSW South Coast that was heavily exposed to forever chemicals leaching off a neighbouring Defence base.
The documentaryHow to Poison a Planet also revealed how Wall Street giant 3M made billions from the family of non-stick and stain-repellent chemicals while allegedly covering up the fact that their factory had contaminated the blood of nearly every person in the world.
The company is accused ofwaging a campaign to suppress scientific evidence of the chemicals’ links to cancer and a slew of other adverse effects,including high cholesterol and immune dysfunction.