The AP reports that Luigino's Inc. is suing the state for failing to disclose a class-action lawsuit against DuPont, whose Washington Works plant is accused of polluting local water supplies with the Teflon chemical. DuPont settled the suit in 2002 without admitting liability, but is still facing an EPA investigation for failing to disclose the health effects of the chemical.
The Teflon chemical is found in the blood of more than 95 percent of Americans.
It never breaks down in the environment and causes cancer and birth defects in animal tests. Some of the EPA charges focus on the company's coverup of birth defects in babies born to workers at its Parkersburg plant.
For more information on EWG's work on the Teflon chemical, please visit https://www.ewg.org/issues/siteindex/issues.php?issueid=5014.
Businesses that object to tough pollution standards often hold communities or states hostage by threatening to take their jobs and move. Now the shoe is on the other foot in West Virginia, where a frozen-foods company refused to bring its plant to the town of Parkersburg, where the water is contaminated with the Teflon chemical C8.
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