RIVM has known about PFAS in eggs beyond Dordrecht for years

The Dutch Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) has known for years that there are high concentrations of toxic PFAS in eggs from hobby chicken keepers throughout the Netherlands. The institute published a study that showed this in 2015, NOS reports.

In December, the RIVM and health service GGD warned residents of Dordrecht to stop eating eggs laid by their own chickens after a study showed that the eggs in that region contain more PFAS than the European Union’s safe-consumption limit. The RIVM did the study in Dordrecht due to the presence of the Chemours factory, which has emitted and discharged large amounts of PFAS there for years.

Last month, NOS did its own study and also found high concentrations of PFAS in hobby chicken keepers’ eggs in Friesland, Utrecht, and Limburg. The RIVM then told NOS it was considering a nationwide study into PFAS in eggs.

But the broadcaster now found that such a study had already been done and published nine years ago. Researchers from Wageningen University examined eggs from 73 hobby chicken keepers and 22 professional chicken farms in the Netherlands. They found virtually no PFAS contamination on the farm eggs, but much higher PFAS levels in the eggs from hobby keepers. The level was below the EU’s PFAS limit that applied at the time, but that limit has become much stricter in the years since. Under the current rules, half of the hobby eggs tested in the 2015 study contained too much PFAS to be sold, according to NOS.

A spokesperson for the RIVM told the broadcaster that the 2015 study can’t be compared to the recent one in Dordrecht because measuring methods have become much more sensitive in the intervening decade. The full results of the Dordrecht study are also not yet available. The RIVM quickly decided to discourage the consumption of hobby eggs in Dordrecht based on how high the values were in the preliminary results. The RIVM doesn’t want to do the same nationwide based on research using outdated measuring methods, the spokesperson said.

“Giving national advice not to eat private eggs anymore is not a message we can give lightly. If we, as the RIVM, give such advice, we must be sure that the advice is necessary,” the spokesperson said. He added that the Dutch Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA) would soon “carry out a risk assessment” on PFAS in eggs.

Professor Jacob de Boer and university researcher Chiel Jonker called it weird that the RIVM is using outdated measuring methods as a reason not to warn of a potential risk. According to them, the fact that scientists found too-high levels of PFAS using less sensitive measuring methods should be reason for alarm, not complacency. “The samples that were negative at the time might now also show a PFAS content. That could only have made the total higher, not lower,” De Boer said.

PFAS is a collective name for thousands of chemical substances that can be harmful to people and the environment. PFAS are typically used to make non-stick coatings and products that resist heat, oil, stains, grease, and water.