← The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
Wellness Unmasked: Forever Chemicals & Your Kids: The Hidden PFAS Health Risks You Can’t Ignore
00:21:27
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Welcome to Wellness unmass. I'm Dr. Nicole Safire. I hope everyone's enjoying March and it's starting to look like spring wherever you are. I just came back from being away for two weeks and I was cold and wet for about those whole two weeks. I was away half of it. I was kind of in a colder climate with a lot of rain and then we went skiing. So I was excited to come back home thinking, hey, maybe spring has sprung because I was getting reports from home that it had been warm, warm and sunny while we are away. Well, it's cold and rainy. I guess that we brought that cold and rainy weather with us, but that's okay. I'm starting to see the buds on trees. I believe spring is on its way. I'm going to maintain that positive outlook and hope we don't have a last minute snowstorm at the end of March. Sometimes that happens here in the Northeast, but you know, fingers crossed we're going to think positively. I was kind of perusing topics on my flight home, like what are we going to talk about this week? And I've tried to stay away from being online while I was away. That's a big thing I do. But there's a lot of talk about vaccines. The fact that the CDC is in an entire state of disarray. They're running on a deadline. They have to appoint a CDC director. They still haven't confirmed the surgeon general, the hhs. Right now, it's kind of a mess. And I don't want to talk about it though, because we've talked about it a lot. There's not a lot of new information going on right now. So we're not going to waste this episode talking about that. But maybe we'll have an update for the rundown later this week. What I did see was a small study, mind you, very small study. But studies like this kind of pique my Interest, because my common sense tells me that this is an issue. And when I actually see in writing, I get a little bit nervous and I wonder if I'm doing enough as a mom, and I wonder if as a society, we're doing enough. So let's just talk about it. Essentially, what I saw was, again, a very small study published in the Journal of Endocrine Society raising concerns that these forever chemicals, I'm not sure if you've heard that term before. You probably have, but when you talk about, quote, unquote, forever chemicals, we're talking about pfas per and polyfluoroalkyl substances. These chemicals, they're everywhere. They're in our water, they're in our food, they're in our cookware, they're also in our clothing. We've mentioned them here on Wellness En Masse, but I want to kind of dive into the study a little bit more, breaking down what the study found, what we already know about PFAS and health, and most importantly, what we can do about it. So let's start with this new study. It was a prospective birth cohort study, which usually when you see studies like this, they're retrospective, meaning they're looking back at old data. And there's usually a lot of confounding factors. But this is interesting because this was a prospective study looking at 218 children. Obviously, that's a small number in the world of research. And tracking the PFAS exposure from birth through age 12, researchers measured PFAS levels at multiple time points at birth, you know, their cord blood, seeing how much they were exposed to in utero via their mother, age 3 and age 8 and age 12. Then they looked at the bone mineral density at the age 12, because this is a really critical time for bone development as kids in their pre adolescence, as their hormones are starting to change, their growth plates are starting to close. This is when you look at how strong are those bones, how well are they growing and developing? And here's what they found in the study. Higher levels of pfoa, which is one of the most common pfas, were consistently associated with lower bone density, particularly in the forearm. Forearm is the area between your elbow and your wrist. We look at these bones when we're trying to gauge the age of a patient's bones and how well the bones are, the effect appeared stronger in girls and boys. But most importantly, timing matter, meaning exposure during certain developmental windows had different impacts on the bone. So that's interesting right now, again, not a massive study. I want to continue to say, there's always limitations with studies, but this study is significant because it followed children over time, it looked at real life exposure, and it reinforces what we've already been seeing in earlier data, that these chemicals may be interfering with how children are growing, specifically how children build bone during the most critical years of development. And because bone health, it's not just about childhood, about 40% of total bone mass is built during adolescence. You know, kind of our 11 through 15, 11 through 16 years of age. And if that process is disrupted even slightly, it can lower total bone mass, it can increase fracture risk, it can raise the likelihood of osteoporosis later in life, and it can also affect, you know, how tall or how well the child grows. The mechanism here is concerning in the sense that, well, how is this impacting? Is it because the PFAS are being directly deposited into the bone, or are they endocrine disruptors, which we kind of already known about them, meaning they're interfering with hormones, the hormones that are responsible for making bones grow. So the research, not just this current study we're talking about, but existing research, is that these PFAS chemicals, they think that maybe they bind to vitamin D receptors and this is impairing bone mineralization, you know, the bone from forming in the first place. They also have shown that they could be disrupting thyroid hormones. Thyroid hormones are very important for our overall body formation. It impacts our physical health, our immune health, our mental health, all of those. It can also affect sex hormones during puberty, which has been largely discussed in the sense that we are having lower fertility rates on the female side. Also on the male side, we're also seeing higher levels of polycystic ovarian syndrome and other things. And it has been pointed to. Well, we believe that there are external factors that are disrupting the normal endocrine channels, and these forever chemicals are probably one of them. But it's not just about environmental exposure. This is all about biological interference during our development. And yes, these things come from our environment, but it's not just the air we breathe. We have to take a deeper look into what actually contains all of these forever chemicals, these endocrine disruptors. So this study, it's just one piece of a much larger puzzle. Because PFAs are called forever chemicals for a reason. They don't break down in the environment. They accumulate in the body, and they can remain there for years, even decades. In fact, their half life in humans is estimated to be anywhere from two years to nine years. If you think about that if you think an exposure to a chemical on day one, and it's going to last for at least nine years throughout your body, if you are continuously exposed to that chemical, just think about how much accumulates. Of course it's going to affect the body. And the exposure obviously starts early. Babies are exposed to these forever chemicals in utero because adults are being exposed to them as well. We already know from other data these forever chemicals can cross the placenta. They're also found in breast milk. And children are exposed through water, food, and household products. For babies that use formula, okay, maybe they're avoiding it from the breast milk, but let's talk about that water. You're mixing the formula in forever chemicals in that water, too. Now, other research has linked these forever chemical exposures to what we're talking about today. You know, the lower bone density. They've also linked it to reduced growth and lean body mass in early childhood, meaning the amount of muscle neurodevelopmental changes and brain structure differences. People are continuously talking about the rise in autism rates. Well, we also have data showing that these forever chemicals are disrupting neurons and brain development. Also, adverse birth outcomes, including low birth weight and preterm birth. For women who are exposed to more forever chemicals, their babies are born smaller, and sometimes they're even born prematurely. So it's pretty clear that these forever chemicals are affecting us in many different ways. And beyond children, we're also seeing associations with fertility issues, like I've mentioned, hormonal disruption, like we've mentioned cardiovascular effects. They've actually looked at arteries throughout the body. You know, the little tubes that take your oxygenated blood from the heart, and it feeds the nutrients all throughout the body. Instead of just these plaques that we have always seen, these plaques that are created by cholesterol that cause our atherosclerotic disease or our heart disease or peripheral vascular disease. You've heard about. Well, now that they're starting to look in these arteries, and do you know what else they're seeing? They're seeing microplastics. They're seeing forever chemicals. All of these external things that we are exposed to are building up into our vascular system. So if our poor diet wasn't enough, we have forever chemicals that are trying to narrow all these blood vessels. And as we know, as they get narrowed, it can cause stroke, dementia, heart attack, peripheral neuropathy, peripheral vascular disease, and all these other things. It can affect us in so many different ways. Kidney disease and other things, blindness. I mean, the list goes on and on and on it also can affect our immune system. So while this new study is focusing just on bone health, the broader concern is absolutely clear. These chemicals are interacting with not just one part of our body, but our entire body, our entire health is being negatively impacted by these forever chemicals. And honestly, it's a big wastebasket in the sense that if you're talking about forever chemicals, you might as well talk about microplastics and nanoplastics because they're all part of the same thing. They're all part of the exposure because of all of these modern day inventions which we love so much. But when they were invented, they didn't think about the long term consequences of the exposure to some of the materials that they were putting in. Things that were making them so convenient. Like what are the most common sources for these forever chemicals? Well, things that we love, things that make our life super convenient. So drinking water. We've talked about this. Especially near industrial sites, military bases, nonstick cookware, fast food packaging, and any sort of plastic wrappers, stain resistant fabrics and carpets. That's right. We just spray it all with chemicals. It's great for stopping stains, but we're exposed to it. Think about when you're laying on the carpet. Especially kids love to lay on the carpets. My kids love being on the carpets. Play with the dogs on there. Well, what are they absorbing through their skin when they're laying on that carpet? Personal care products like cosmetics, lotions, lipsticks. Anything that you're putting on your body is being absorbed into your body. Because our skin is one of our largest organ systems and it absorbs things. So if you're laying your skin, I mean, I put on lotion at least twice a day. What am I actually putting on my body? If you look at some of the ingredients, it's concerning. It's not like we're just putting on olive oil, which is probably the only thing we should be rubbing our body in. And I'm not just saying that because I'm Italian and I am a fan of olive oil as a moisturizer. But the reality is most of the stuff that we put all over our body has chemicals in it. And more. Most importantly though, kids are often more exposed than adults, mainly because it's affecting them more because their body's constantly changing. So as they're being exposed to this, their cells are dividing a little bit faster and it can really disrupt their formation. So here's the part for me at least, that matters the most. It's. I hate talking about some of these things because it's like, well, we can't avoid these forever chemicals, really, unless we're gonna go and live in a glass bubble and never be exposed to any sort of toxin. I mean, that's just not reality. It's not reality in the modern industrial that we live in. But there really are some things that you can do to decrease exposure to these forever chemicals, especially if you are considering getting pregnant. If you're pregnant, if you have young children in the home, you should really start taking some of these steps. I'm going to try and start taking, I already have actually in my home. But here's some easy things that you can do. Filter your water. Don't just take it out of the tap. Look for filters that are certified for PFAS removal. They will actually say that on the labels specifically. I don't know if you want to write this down, but if you Specifically look for NSF, ANSI, 53 or 58, these are supposed to be certified to remove PFAS from the water. This is one of the highest impact changes you can make because that is the one of the biggest sources of our consumption and exposure of these forever chemicals is through the water that we drink. Also rethink cookware. Listen, I get it. Nonstick pans. They're amazing. I used to love them. We've actually gotten rid of nonstick pans in my household. We have now switched to ceramic and cast iron and that's all we use. And we don't use plastic spatulas on these. Just again as a way to reduce the microplastics. Listen, ceramic, not nearly as easy to cook eggs on. Full disclosure, and you know, we love eggs in our household. I have hens. We cook eggs maybe four or five days a week because I just think they're incredible for nutrients and protein. And since we have the hens outside, it's a, you know, I, I, I am able to control what's going into the hens and therefore what's being consumed by my family. I do not love cooking eggs on ceramic, but I will tell you, it's worth it. In my opinion, it's worth the headache a little bit. Instead of having a nonstick pan, we do have one tiny nonstick pan in case we ever really want it for eggs. But I'm trying really hard not to use it. But I do reserve the right to use it occasionally because I'll tell you, sometimes it's very difficult. Eggs on those ceramic pans. Now you should try to reduce packaged and fast foods for many reasons. The forever Chemicals, the microplastics and the fact that they're usually ultra process. There's a plethora of data that tells us ultra process is bad for our health anyway. So those takeout containers, anything that's wrapped in plastic, if you can avoid them, I highly recommend avoiding it. When you're at the grocery store, do your best to stay in the periphery of the grocery store for your fresh fruits and vegetables and meats. And avoid everything in the center because that tends to be more ultra processed, tends to be more plastic in that area. Whatever you can do. Anything that's stain resistant, you know, stain resistant clothes, stain resistant blankets and carpets, anything labeled waterproof, wrinkle free, stain resistant, high probability they have some sort of pfas, you know, forever chemicals in it, unless it is specifically labeled PFAS free. So, you know, as you're shopping for things, you can actually look for that on the label PFAS free. That's the way to go. It sounds horrible, but like raincoats, most of them have forever chemicals in it. It's awful. I'm sorry. We're all still gonna keep wearing raincoats. I get it. But I just wanna make you aware of these things, right in your house, you wanna use HEPA filters if possible. Make sure you're constantly changing your H vac filters. Try to reduce exposure through the air. Cause we take the air from the outside and it's coming inside. Dust in our house can kind of cling to those forever chemicals. So I have some air purifiers in our household. You know, we do try to change our H vac filters on a regular basis. But on top of that, I do have some HEPA indoor filters. One, because a couple people in our household have really bad seasonal allergies. So I try to keep the inside as clean as possible. We also have dogs, and dogs bring in crap from the outside. So we brush them, we clean them on a weekly basis. And I just put in extra filters in size just to try and decrease that dust and any other toxin exposure. And I don't know that's really what you can do from a lifestyle perspective. We also, since we can't reduce our exposure entirely, some of the big things you can do, especially in kids, make sure that they're getting enough calcium and vitamin D. Since we know PFAS from this study affects the vitamin D absorption. So that's how it affects the bones. So make sure your kids are getting vitamin D in the wintertime. Consider vitamin D supplementation, because if your kids are outside A good amount. You know, you don't have to be outside a ton to get adequate vitamin D exposure from the sun. But in the wintertime when it's dark and gloomy and we have shorter sunlight hours, you may want to consider vitamin D supplements if they don't drink enough milk. I mean, my kids thankfully love milk. They have been drinking whole milk since they were one year old when they stopped breastfeeding and they have a glass of milk every single day. They also get adequate sun exposure because vitamin D, it's crucial for your physical health, your mental health and something that I have really tried to educate my children on. You want to make sure they're also doing weight bearing exercises. Weight bearing exercises keep your bones strong. Not just kids, adults too. Premenopausal, perimenopausal, postmenopausal. Ladies, I'm talking to you. Weightlifting, very important for our bone health as we get older. And no, I don't want your kids going and lifting iron in the the gym, but they absolutely can be lifting light weights because you want to make sure that they have the muscle mass that is supporting their bone structure and that'll help them have less bone injuries. Kids break bones all the time. So if you have strong muscle around the bones, they're less likely to break their bones. And you know, really you can get all of this from just a nutrient dense diet. If your kids are getting enough fruits and vegetables and meats and dairy, they're getting what they need. Unless they have some sort of metabolic or nutritional deficiency, which obviously you want to talk to your doctor about. But kids for the most part don't need to be taking supplements. They should be just having nutritious meals and getting enough exercise and sun exposure. So obviously, you know where I land on this, this new study, it's small, but it's meaningful and it just adds to a huge growing body of evidence that environmental exposures are really shaping long term health in ways that we're only beginning to understand. And when it comes to our kids, the bar should be set so much higher. We don't need to panic. But we also don't need to wait for absolute certainty. We don't need to wait for five or ten years for them to say, okay, we've reviewed the data for the last 20 years and oh, these forehead chemicals, they're impacting us negatively. There's enough evidence at this point for us to say we need to be making some changes. I'm making changes in my household. I'm imploring you to make some changes in your household because by the time we have perfect data, the exposure's already happened. It's already accumulated. So this is about awareness. It's about making some smart choices where we can, reducing risk whenever possible and just pushing for better transparency and regulation where needed. Because protecting long term health, it doesn't just happen. You know, your doctor doesn't have to tell you this. Your doctor's probably not going to have a conversation with you about forever chemicals. Okay? This is on you. Take control. Take control of your household, take control of your kids environment and also what you're exposed to as well. We only live once so it starts in the environment that we create for ourselves and our families every single day. Thank you so much for listening to this important conversation on wellness en masse. I hope you learned something. I hope you think about it. Maybe you're gonna make some changes, maybe you won't. Spread the word. Spread the good word because I think this information's very important. I'm Dr. Nicole Saf. Make sure you listen to Wellness on Mass on iHeartRadio Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcasts and we'll see you next time. Hi, this is Dr. Nicole Safire from Wellness on Mass. Are you struggling to see up close? Make it visible with viz. VIZ is a once daily prescription eye drop to treat blurry near vision for up to 10 hours. The most common side effects that may be experienced while using VIZ includes eye irritation, temporary dim or dark vision, headaches and eye redness. Talk to an eye doctor to learn if VIZ is right for you. Learn more@viz.com that's V I Z Z.com
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this is Martha Stewart from the Martha Stewart Podcast. Ever wonder how to make hosting look effortless? Here's a secret. When prepping for cooking and baking, get ahead of the mess with new Reynolds Kitchens countertop prep paper. Just lightly wet the counter so the paper grips. Lay it down and drips and spills stay on the paper, not on your counter. Cleanup is as simple as lifting it away to reveal clean counters. Effortless it is thanks to Reynolds Kitchens countertop prep paper. Wet it, set it, prep it. Done. Available in the Reynolds wrap aisle at Walmart.
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