Study finds death rate up for 3M workers exposed to PFOA

ST. PAUL (AP) — A new study says 3M workers who were exposed to a chemical called PFOA died of stroke and prostate cancer at higher rates than other workers in the company’s Cottage Grove plant.

However, a company spokesman says the overall death rates from those diseases for all the workers in the plant were lower than the state as a whole. He says that means the spike in PFOA-connected deaths is a statistical anomaly.
The study was done by a University of Minnesota epidemiologist and funded by 3M. The study is dated August 2007.

3M spokesman Bill Nelson says the study was made public when it was filed with the EPA in September 2007. It was submitted to a different EPA data repository last month.

He says nothing in the study changes the company’s conclusion that there are no adverse health effects from PFOA.

PFOA was used in nonstick cookware and other products until about 2002. 3M manufactured PFOA from 1947 to 2000 at its Cottage Grove plant.

PFOA has been shown to accumulate in people’s blood. It has been found in community and private wells in the southeastern Twin Cities area.

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