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Are there PFAS in your Toilet Paper !?!?

Are there PFAS in your Toilet Paper !?!?

Are there PFAS in your toilet paper???

 There’s lots of PFAS in your toilet paper - not only because you’re wiping that on sensitive parts of your body - but because the PFAS that get flushed down the toilet…. End up in your food.

We'll dive into WHY there are PFAS in toilet paper, which brands are the worst - and how it ends up in your food. 

Hint: if you’ve seen any of my other videos - you’ll know that I hate anything that’s made out of recycled materials. Toilet paper is no exception…. Americans go through around 19 billion pounds of toilet paper being flushed away annually. All by itself that represents a massive disposal and sanitation challenge.

Before we even get to the PFAS - there’s lots of other gnarly chemicals in toilet paper:

  1. Chlorine
  2. Formaldehyde
  3. Phthalates
  4. bisphenols (BPA & BPS)
  5. Dioxins
  6. Phthalates or synthetic musk if it’s “scented” paper
  7. Toxic dyes if it’s that printed toilet paper with the crazy patterns
  8. Bleach

But now, according to a paper just published -All of that toilet paper, including major brands sold around the world, turn out to be yet another source of PFAS.

 

PFAS are known as that toxic forever chemicals - and they’re called that because they don’t naturally biodegrade in the environment.

This means that they LAST FOREVER and they also bioaccumulate in your body - including your brain. It causes all sorts of terrible things like:

- Brain cancer

- Other Cancers

- Vaccine Inefficacy

- Overall higher mortality

... and can last in your body for 8-10 years.

There’s over 10,000 different kinds of PFAS, the more they test the more toxic they show to be.

They’re used in lots of consumer products - and since they make things nonstick, you’ll find them in lots of things that are meant to repel water like waterproof mascara, your Teflon pan & sweat-roof leggings.

However, PFAS are used in heavy machinery - to ensure the processing facilities don’t get all clogged up… hence, why they’re in lots of paper products.

Oh yeah, they’re also terribly regulated - especially in the US.

There were a handful that were “phased out” but the “safer replacements” that DuPont & 3m came out with are actually showing to be WORSE than the original toxic ones. The FDA still allows lots in our food… and there is NO national mandate that water supplies be screened for PFAS.

 

A study from March of this year tested all the popular brands of toilet paper for 34 types of pFAS - and the researchers expected that there would be some.

PFAS are used in multiple points in wood pulp processing - with recycled paper—being exposed literally double the amount of virgin paper.

Overwhelmingly, the PFAS that was most present in both toilet paper and in sewage was a species known as 6:2 diPAP, which, as one 2022 study showed,  That is an alarming figure given that the EPA generally measures dangerous levels of PFAS in water supplies in the parts per trillion, not billion so this is literally thousands of times above what the EPA says is safe.

And another reason that this particular kind of pfas is really bad…. Because it breaks down into PFOA - the one that’s had documentaries, movies and IS ACTUALLY BANNED around the world because it’s so incredibly toxic. So yeah, basically, even if an only a small fraction of the 6:2 diPAP evolves into PFOA, it’s greatly exceeding the EPA’s limit.

“Our results suggest that toilet paper should be considered as a potentially major source of PFAS entering wastewater treatment systems.”

Okay that’s gross and all - but we don’t EAT our wastewater, so why does it matter…

Actually you do. Which is why it matters.

Trigger warning: a gross harsh reality that most people don’t want to think about…

All the food you eat was grown with fertilizer.

That fertilizer comes from human beings a lot of the time.

It’s called “Waste water sludge”.

And remember how PFAS can’t be easily destroyed? Yeah, that means that when you wipe yourself with PFAS…. It gets used as fertilizer for your food.

This has already become a major issue, as many organic farmers have lost their businesses and suffered immense financial distress because of the high amount of pfas that ended up in their crops & dairy products.

And there was a huge EXPOSE done by VICE NEWS on how the Wastewater slude industry, yes there’s an industry, is essentially unregulated and has refused to test for PFAS and has said ““Wastewater facilities are not the source of PFAS, and also not designed to remove these chemicals from the process,”

PFAS in wastewater is also bad because this gets into groundwater or it’s merely “treated” in your municipal water supply and then gets turned back into your drinking water.

 

Ok all of this is terrible -

So what do you do? Stop using toilet paper?

Well that’s an option… Bidets are actually really sustainable and eco-friendly.

However, if you’re not ready to go that route - here are the brands of toilet paper that were the worst:

 

In general, the thicker the toilet paper the more PFAS there were

Also, the bamboo products all had some of the highest amounts of pfas as well.

 

The best toilet paper brands were:

In closing I’ll say - by getting a bidet, you'll be able to reduce your exposure to PFAS and all the other toxic chemicals that go along with it.

Here are some bidets to check out to cut down on toilet paper use:

 

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