Read the full article by Cynthia McCormick (Cope Cod Times)
“In their first advisory about consumption of freshwater fish contaminated with PFAS, Massachusetts public health officials Tuesday advised people to limit or exclude fish from five Upper Cape ponds from their diet.
Individuals particularly susceptible to PFAS exposure — children under 12, women of child-bearing age and pregnant and nursing women — were advised not to consume any fish caught in Flax Pond in Bourne, Grews and Jenkins ponds in Falmouth and Johns Pond in Mashpee.
The state Department of Public Health said this group of women and children also were advised not to eat largemouth and smallmouth bass from Mashpee-Wakeby Pond in Mashpee and Sandwich and to limit other species to one meal a week.
PFAS refers to a group of man-made chemicals with bonds so strong and stable they don’t break down in nature and are known as ‘forever chemicals.’
DPH officials said they tested the fish at the five freshwater ponds because they are popular locations for fishing and because they are located on or near Joint Base Cape Cod, where PFAS contamination has been found in ground and surface water.
The state consumption guidelines concern native fish and not stocked trout that are raised in fish hatcheries and released.
Experts explain PFAS in fish
The most restrictive guidelines were from Johns Pond, where the general public was advised not to eat smallmouth bass and to limit other species to one meal a year.
‘I’m a little taken aback,’ said Andrew Gottlieb, executive director of the Association to Preserve Cape Cod.
‘You’d like to think you could put a line in the water, catch a native fish and not ingest chemicals that might be jeopardizing your health,’ Gottlieb said.
Laurel Schaider, senior scientist at the Silent Spring Institute in Newton, which has tested for and found PFAS contamination in Cape Cod drinking water wells, said she’s happy that the state is ‘taking PFAS seriously and testing fish in ponds known to have PFAS contamination.'”…