by Sean Croxton

This one blew me away.

I was taking David Getoff’s holistic health class back in 2008.

The topic of the day was toxins. We covered chlorine and fluoride in the water, mercury in dental amalgams, and eventually landed on cookware.

Personally, it had never even crossed my mind that my Teflon-coated, non-stick cookware was a problem.

David went on to explain that the chemicals in this type of cookware can off-gas, and can also leach these toxic chemicals into the food being cooked.

But that’s not what blew me away.

What blew me away is that Teflon chemicals have been known to kill birds. Yikes!

According to this article by the Environmental Working Group…

“Bird enthusiasts and veterinarians have known for decades that Teflon-coated and other non-stick cookware, if heated to high temperatures, is acutely toxic to birds. The peer-reviewed literature contains numerous reports of bird deaths linked to the use of Teflon and other non-stick pans and appliances in the home, beginning about 30 years ago.”

If Teflon kills birds, I wonder what it’s doing to humans?

According to Randall Fitzgerald in his book The Hundred Year Lie (one of my faves), ninety-percent of Americans have Teflon residue in their blood. One of these chemicals called C8 has been linked to a wide array of birth defects and developmental problems (from Edward Emmett, University of Pennsylvania research, August 2005).