Zürich II Statement on Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFASs): Scientific and Regulatory Needs

Research output: Contribution to journalReviewResearchpeer-review

  • Jamie C. DeWitt
  • Juliane Glüge
  • Ian T. Cousins
  • Gretta Goldenman
  • Dorte Herzke
  • Rainer Lohmann
  • Mark Miller
  • Carla A. Ng
  • Sharyle Patton
  • Lena Vierke
  • Zhanyun Wang
  • Sam Adu-Kumi
  • Simona Balan
  • Andreas M. Buser
  • Tony Fletcher
  • Line Småstuen Haug
  • Jun Huang
  • Sarit Kaserzon
  • Juliana Leonel
  • Ishmail Sheriff
  • Ya Li Shi
  • Sara Valsecchi
  • Martin Scheringer

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are a class of synthetic organic chemicals of global concern. A group of 36 scientists and regulators from 18 countries held a hybrid workshop in 2022 in Zürich, Switzerland. The workshop, a sequel to a previous Zürich workshop held in 2017, deliberated on progress in the last five years and discussed further needs for cooperative scientific research and regulatory action on PFASs. This review reflects discussion and insights gained during and after this workshop and summarizes key signs of progress in science and policy, ongoing critical issues to be addressed, and possible ways forward. Some key take home messages include: 1) understanding of human health effects continues to develop dramatically, 2) regulatory guidelines continue to drop, 3) better understanding of emissions and contamination levels is needed in more parts of the world, 4) analytical methods, while improving, still only cover around 50 PFASs, and 5) discussions of how to group PFASs for regulation (including subgroupings) have gathered momentum with several jurisdictions proposing restricting a large proportion of PFAS uses. It was concluded that more multi-group exchanges are needed in the future and that there should be a greater diversity of participants at future workshops.

Original languageEnglish
JournalEnvironmental Science and Technology Letters
ISSN2328-8930
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - Apr 2024

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Authors. Published by American Chemical Society.

    Research areas

  • bilateral workshops, international cooperation, Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, persistence, PFASs, Zürich Statement

ID: 395025527