The report details how recent EPA decisions have relaxed restrictions on harmful chemicals in food, consumer products, water and air, increasing Americans\u2019 exposure to 12 of the most dangerous and ubiquitous pollutants.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The list includes brain-damaging mercury and pesticides in food; hormone-bending phthalates in consumer products and cancer-causing PFAS \u201cforever chemicals,\u201d lead, arsenic and trichloroethylene in drinking water. Also on the list are the carcinogens benzene, formaldehyde and vinyl chloride in the air, along with heart- and lung-damaging soot and smog. All of these pollutants cause multiple health harms.<\/p>\n
The list does not cover pollutants like greenhouse gases, which also exacerbate health harms, but is meant to illustrate the escalating health costs of Trump administration policy decisions.<\/p>\n
\u201cPolitical leadership is steering the agency away from its responsibility to protect human health and the environment,\u201d the report warns. \u201cMaking Americans safer is a choice and EPA\u2019s current leadership has chosen to make Americans sicker.\u201d<\/p>\n
The vast majority of Americans want their government to do more to protect them from dangerous chemicals, a new survey<\/a> from The Pew Charitable Trusts found. More than 80 percent want the government and business to increase transparency around the use of chemicals.<\/p>\n Yet getting information from the current EPA is \u201clike pulling teeth,\u201d Boom said. \u201cIt\u2019s probably the least transparent EPA we\u2019ve ever had.\u201d<\/p>\n The EPA has abandoned its oversight duty and failed to let Americans know what chemicals are doing to their health, said Betsy Southerland, former director of EPA\u2019s Office of Science and Technology in the Office of Water.\u00a0<\/p>\n As one example, said Sutherland, who is an expert on the health effects of notoriously indestructible forever chemicals, \u201cwe\u2019re seeing fewer guardrails to prevent PFAS exposure and much less transparency about the risk.\u201d<\/p>\n PFAS contaminate nearly half of all drinking water across the country, scientists with the U.S. Geological Survey reported in a 2023 study<\/a>. Nearly all Americans, including babies<\/a>, have PFAS in their blood<\/a>.<\/p>\n Companies who handle PFAS have been given more leeway while the EPA is delaying safeguards and withholding science data, Sutherland said.\u00a0<\/p>\n EPA officials have delayed deadlines that prohibit companies from discharging PFAS into waterways and require drinking water systems to take the hormone-disrupting chemicals out of tap water, she said. They have proposed exempting importers from PFAS reporting requirements<\/a>, leaving consumers in the dark about what\u2019s in the products they buy, and they\u2019ve buried reports on PFAS health risks, she added.<\/p>\n \u201cThat means Americans\u2019 toxic exposure is going up,\u201d Southerland said, \u201cand so are our health risks.\u201d<\/p>\n Inside Climate News asked the EPA to comment on the EPN report and explain how delaying water standards for PFAS and granting waivers to coal-fired plants, which emit mercury, lead and other pollutants, makes Americans healthier.\u00a0<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n \t<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t \t\t\tWithout Weighing Costs to Public Health, EPA Rolls Back Air Pollution Standards for Coal Plants\t\t<\/p>\n \t\t\tBy Kiley Bense<\/p>\n \t<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cReferring to EPN as nonpartisan is laughable; its staff and board is loaded with Democratic operatives,\u201d an EPA spokesperson said in a statement. \u201cWhile, unsurprisingly, EPN is engaging in dishonest fearmongering to drum up media attention and donations, the Trump EPA is taking real steps to protect human health and the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n Although the EPA is rolling back regulations on PFAS<\/a> and allowing higher lead levels<\/a> in soil, the spokesperson called the Trump EPA \u201cunmatched\u201d in fighting these contaminants. \u201cThe Trump EPA is committed to transparency and gold-standard science like never before to deliver on our core statutory responsibilities of protecting human health and the environment while Powering the Great American Comeback.\u201d<\/p>\n Less Regulation, More Disease<\/p>\n Hundreds of the 80,000 chemicals registered<\/a> for use under the U.S. Toxic Substances Control Act are known to be dangerous, though just a fraction have undergone safety testing. The multiple harms associated with the chemicals listed in the EPN report are well-documented.<\/p>\n America\u2019s nurses are on the front lines of addressing the health impacts of toxic chemical exposures, said Sarah Bucic, a registered nurse and policy analyst with the nonpartisan Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments.\u00a0<\/p>\n At the briefing, Bucic ran through the ills she expects the EPA\u2019s deregulatory agenda<\/a> will cause. More soot in the air will mean more children treated for asthma and lung diseases. More lead will result in more children with developmental, behavioral and attention-deficit problems. More benzene will lead to higher rates of blood cancers while more trichloroethylene will contribute to kidney and liver cancers, Parkinson\u2019s disease and fetal heart defects.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s nothing more heartbreaking than treating a patient, especially a child, who is sick because of something we could have prevented,\u201d Bucic said.<\/p>\n Afif El-Hasan, an Orange County pediatrician and board director of the American Lung Association, is most concerned about loosened rules that increase exposure to soot, or PM2.5.\u00a0<\/p>\n These tiny particles easily bypass the defenses of the lungs and enter the bloodstream, posing outsize risks<\/a> to children\u2019s still-developing lungs and immune system.<\/p>\n The EPA strengthened the national PM2.5 standard<\/a> in 2024 based on hundreds of scientific studies, El-Hasan said, a move that was projected to prevent thousands of premature deaths and millions of asthma attacks over time. \u201cNow, unfortunately, the EPA is failing to enforce these standards and is even trying to roll them back.\u201d<\/p>\n And the EPA recently repealed measures<\/a> to make coal and oil-fired power plants cleaner, El-Hasan said.\u00a0<\/p>\n This story is funded by readers like you.<\/p>\n Our nonprofit newsroom provides award-winning climate coverage free of charge and advertising. We rely on donations from readers like you to keep going. Please donate now to support our work.<\/p>\n Donate Now<\/a> <\/p>\n Weakening the guardrails that keep soot out of the air will mean more kids in the emergency room struggling to breathe, he said. \u201cIt means more missed school days. It means more missed work days for the parents that have to stay home and take care of the children.\u201d<\/p>\n El-Hasan hopes that academic and public health institutions monitor and document the health consequences of all these rollbacks. \u201cIt\u2019s very important that that is captured,\u201d he said. \u201cSo that this mistake is never made again.\u201d<\/p>\n Exposure Is a Choice<\/p>\n Health experts with EPN hope the report helps people understand the complex web of toxic exposures they encounter in daily life, where they come from and how recent policy decisions are increasing those exposures.<\/p>\n For decades, Americans have relied on EPA scientists to answer basic questions about the harms posed by exposure to a toxic chemical in the air, water and soil, said Chris Frey, a former EPA science advisor and leader of the Office of Research and Development, the agency\u2019s independent scientific arm. \u201cOver the last 13 months, EPA\u2019s scientific backbone has been substantially diminished in ways that will affect Americans\u2019 health and safety.\u201d<\/p>\n Frey pointed to formaldehyde as just one example of the consequences of the EPA\u2019s decision to overturn safeguards against toxic chemicals.\u00a0<\/p>\n Nearly all Americans are exposed to some level of formaldehyde, which escapes from building materials like cabinets and flooring, and from personal care products like cosmetics.\u00a0<\/p>\n In 2024, the EPA concluded, after more than three decades of scientific review, that formaldehyde poses cancer risk at any exposure level. The agency was on track to require companies to lessen or eliminate formaldehyde-related health risks, Frey said. \u201cBut current EPA leadership is now moving to ignore its own scientific findings,\u201d he said, \u201ceffectively letting companies put this dangerous chemical back into play.\u201d<\/p>\n There are steps consumers can take to reduce their risks, like using certified filters to reduce PFAS in their tap water and avoiding solvents with formaldehyde.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBut the burden should not fall on individuals and families to manage chemical risks on their own,\u201d Frey said. \u201cEPA needs to follow the science and ensure that polluting companies follow safeguards that put Americans\u2019 health first.\u201d<\/p>\n Even as the EPN team recounted numerous ways the EPA is stripping Americans of health protections, they remain hopeful that the rollbacks can be reversed.<\/p>\n Although ORD is now almost completely depopulated and is going to be shuttered formally, Frey said, a significant amount of its former workforce remain at the EPA. \u201cThey may not be in the roles that are best suited to their talents and experience and capabilities, but they\u2019re still there,\u201d he said, adding that the physical infrastructure of the research labs is still intact.<\/p>\n Both could be harnessed to restore the EPA\u2019s mission, Frey said. \u201cBut you know, time is ticking. And the longer the destruction continues, the harder it will be to recover.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2261216187-330x220.jpg\")
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Sarah Bucic, a registered nurse and policy analyst with the nonpartisan Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments, speaks during a virtual press briefing<\/a> hosted by Environmental Protection Network on Thursday.<\/p>\n
![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2261295897.jpg\")
President Donald Trump speaks alongside EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin during an event announcing the rollback of the endangerment finding at the White House on Thursday. Credit: Anna Moneymaker\/Getty Images<\/p>\n![\"Liza](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/LizaGross-300x300.jpg\")
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