Teflon-coated cookware safe to use (Xinhua) Updated: 2004-10-13 17:02
An official test shows that perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), a synthetic
chemical that may cause health and environmental problems, was not detected in
Chinese non-stick cookware.
China's State Administration of Quality Supervision and Quarantine Wednesday
announced the test results made by China's state supervision and quarantine
academy.
Before the results were released, they were reviewed by an independent expert
group including academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). The group
unanimously agreed that the results are reliable, according the administration.
The test group of the supervision and quarantine academy examined 28 kinds of
non-stick cookware from 18 major brands + accounting for 90 percent of the
product available in Chinese markets.
PFOA is a key ingredient used to make Teflon, a non-stick coating for frying
pans. The US Environmental Protection Agency alleged that Delaware-based
manufacture DuPont repeatedly failed over a 20-year period to report information
about health and environment risks from PFOA.
Although DuPont denies it failed to meet reporting requirements or that
Teflon-coated cookware poses any threat to human health, the report caused many
worries in China, which may pose a huge threat to China's non-stick cookware
business.
