Greenpeace Italy has released a new report pinpointing what it describes as four global “pollution hotspots” where chemical companies producing per- and polyfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) have contaminated the environment, raising concerns about the health of surrounding residents. The four production sites identified by Greenpeace as pollution hotspots are located in the Shandong Province of China, the Veneto region of Italy, Dordrecht in the Netherlands, and the Mid-Ohio valley in the U.S. Currently, the majority of scientific evidence regarding the negative health effects of PFCs refers to long chain PFCs, such as PFOA and PFOS. Over the past few years, sport and outdoor brands have been shifting to shorter-chain chemicals in order to reduce the potential negative impact, although Greenpeace has called for a total ban of the entire hazardous PFC group. Europe and the U.S. have mostly replaced longer-chain PFCs with short-chain PFCs but PFOA is still being used in some factories in China. In its recent report, which was released on Nov. 15, Greenpeace refers in particular to the impact of accumulated long-chain PFC pollution on the human body at the four hotspots. According to the environmental watchdog, data from third-party studies show that contamination has spread from the environment around the chemical plants in those areas to the residents of local communities.

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