Large swathes of Los Angeles and the surrounding areas are being sprayed with carcinogenic cancer causing chemical fire retardant. Polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs increase the risk of cancer by 300% and this stuff is being sprayed over thousands of acres of land in Los Angeles. These chemicals stay in the ecosystem and leech into the water table.
Cancer Risk
If people go back to live in the areas that have been sprayed along with the brave firemen and women who are on the front line of the fire fight will possibly be at risk of contracting cancer in the future.
Endocrine disruptors are chemicals that can interfere and interact with the endocrine system, resulting in altered hormonal signalling and function. PBDEs are common endocrine disruptors that have been commonly used in industrial products and fire retardants, and their environmental accumulation has become a rising concern. Human exposure to PBDEs has been shown to influence glucose metabolism, thyroid and ovarian function and potentially affect cancer risk.
Wildfires themselves unlock cancer causing chemicals that affect humans.
The blistering heat from wildfires can transform one metal, chromium, from its benign version into toxic airborne particles that put firefighters and people living nearby at risk, according to the study published in the journal Nature Communications in December 2023.
“In the complex mixture of gasses and particles that wildfires spew out as smoke and leave behind as dust, heavy metals such as chromium have largely been overlooked,” Scott Fendorf, co-author of the study and professor at the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability, said in a press release.
Chromium is common in soils across the western United States, Australia, Brazil, Europe, Indonesia and South Africa.
Certain natural chemical processes can trigger a transformation of the metal from a benign form, called chromium 3, into a carcinogen called hexavalent chromium, or chromium 6. The toxin — which became infamous through the 2000 film “Erin Brockovich” — can cause cancer, organ damage and other health issues.
