Gore Tex dangerous?

I heard this today on the National NBC news. They were saying a chemical used in making: Gore Tex, Scotchguard, Stainmaster Carpet and Teflon was causing cancer. My dad was about to buy a Gore Tex jacket and now he won't until I find out about this. I have looked all over but I can't find any info on it. I have a hard time believing this, the media gets carried away, but they compared it to DDT and Asbestos in terms of common useage.

Anybody hear about this?

Take it with a grain of salt. Could very well be "Junk Science" just like the banning of DDT. Enough of anything causes cancer.

Could be someone heard of flourine. Nasty stuff by itself. I would recommend your dad not eat his Goretex clothing. But that's just me talking.

Someone is serious about this stuff, they said that Scotchguard took it out of their product in 2001. It seems like it just had initials.

Wouldn't people be dropping like flies if this were the case? Gore-Tex has been around for awhile now.
It may be true that a chemical used in it's production is dangerous, but what isn't? I wouldn't want to lick the floors in the production facility, no. But isn't Gore-Tex just a hollow fiber, like any other fiber filling for a jacket?

Goretex is a waterproof but breathable membrane. It is a PTFE (Teflon) product laminated to a material suitable for the intended purpose. I beleive it was developed for surgical dressings.

Reminds me of a bogus lab report a small group of us turned in to our biology instructor many years ago (about 40?). This was in addition to our REAL labs, and just as a sort of tongue-in-cheek for our instructor. He enjoyed it.

I'll have to set this up just a bit first, by reminding you that the testing done on animals to see if a chemical is dangerous is often (usually) done using incredible overdoses to hurry the process along. Things like giving lab animals 500 to 3000 times the "normal" dose/exposure by weight.

What we did was to make up a short series of lab tests to check on the toxicity of DHMO - Dihydromonoxide (pure distilled water).

To make a long story short, we reported that the experiment had to be terminated after the chemical was found to be "fatal when ingested" and "therefore extremely toxic" to 32 of the 32 mice on hand for the project: Every one of them had spontaneously exploded at some point when being force-fed the initial 1000X daily dose of the DHMO. (Essentially trying to force about a pint of water into each mouse IIRC ... )

The findings of the project, of course, included that ingesting water, even pure distilled water, was 100 percent fatal to mice, and therefore water was highly poisonous, and probably should not be ingested by humans until further tests could be made to confirm or deny it's extreme toxicity.

Etc., etc.

(In reality, no mice were harmed in our testing, there WAS no testing and in fact one of the, uh, "test subjects" ended up living in a nice terrarium at my place for several years - Priscilla was a nice little mouse ... )



-= MICROSOFT FREE ZONE =-

When I was first hired as a firefighter in 1987 a Captain heard I could cook and requested me to be on his shift. One day I brought a nice aluminum saute pan from home and cooked chicken breasts for the station house. He went ballistic at the dinner table and refused to eat anything! He was sure aluminum caused alzheimers disease. I explained that "theory" had been debunked years ago. He didn't care about the facts, his mind was made up. No aluminum allowed in the station! He was later fired for defrauding the city, a felony.

Isn't Gore-Tex just a porous polyurethane membrane sandwiched between a nylon microfibre and a polyester backing/liner?

I know alot of urethane fabrics are toxic while they are in the manufacturing process (they off-gas as they come off the bolt of fresh fabric into the garment process and the fumes are dangerous) but they are safe as can be when they are through the process ( fully cured and done off-gassing).

I am really interested in this now as I wonder what could possibly be cancer causing in these garments that wouldn't be in any other synthetic garment!

Later,
TSG /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Keep in mind that chemicals used in Processing a material are quite different than chemicals contained Within the finished product. Etched glass uses Hydro-Flouric acid to produce patterns in glass (this acid would be more than happy to disolve you if you placed body parts into it), but just touching the finished product will not harm you. Gore-Tex is so non-reactive with your body that it can be used as temporary skin grafts or even used to rebuild arterial walls w/o your body even noticing it there or trying to reject it. It also doesn't leach any chemicals out of the fibres after manufacture.

Of course, don't take my word on something this important. Try to collect as much information on it (from reputable sources) before you make your final decision. But I'm VERY confident that you'll find Gore-Tex to be one of the more innocuous (and beneficial) substances to the human body. It's good stuff in my book !

I worked, "lived" and slept in Gore-Tex almost constantly for a couple of years and haven't died yet. No cancer either, as far as I know.

Chemical in Teflon, Gore-Tex, other products may cause health problems

http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/5632921.htm

Try a search on http://news.google.com for gore-tex

Latest tests on Aluminum do seem to show a statistical correlation between monometric aluminum in drinking water and Alzheimer's. At least in one study in Italy. However, you do not get monometric aluminum from cook ware or any other metalic aluminum products. Similar to trying to link water to fires becuase it contains hydrogen which is explosive /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif So, while individual aluminum atoms MIGHT be cause for further study, this isn't what you can get from cookware. So you're safe there.

As far as Gore Tex, the info is too new for the actual studies to have been posted anywhere that I can find and there is no more information that isn't written by frightened news reporters.

I don't think that the Gore Tex itself is the problem though, but rather the manufacture of it. From what I can gather the chemical in question a perfluorochemical is used in the production of gore tex, but isn't actually part of the final product. So if you work in the plant filling the PFC tank, then you might have to worry, but just wearing the jacket does not constitute a risk.

Of course I could be wrong, but thats what I was able to ferret out at this point.

I generally go by the inverse relationship between how fast I'm going to get cancer as represented by the news and how real the risk actually is. And once people start calling "PLEASE WONT SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN" I know that I am almost completely out of harms way. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

It doesn't surprise me that an "environmental activists group" is pushing the issue. These same groups are calling for an end to farming in California, no cattle west of the rockies and a halt to logging and mining. Their America will only consume while "others" will produce.

BTW it that lawyers I smell?

http://www.azom.com/news.asp?newsID=584

http://www.legalnewswatch.com/news_186.html

http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/news/5632921.htm

[ QUOTE ]
shankus said:
Wouldn't people be dropping like flies if this were the case?

[/ QUOTE ]

There is no way that I have enough information to get into support or rejection of the information. But, I do find Shankus' question interesting. It's not intended to argue the case or anything, but do keep in mind that we are dropping like flies. The mortality rate for humans is still 100%, and cancer is playing a significant role in the statistics.

Empath, if you can lessen that mortality rate would PM with the solution? Thanks in advance. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

Oops, I didn't know that icon stuck its tongue out.

It's not within my power to drop man's mortality rate.

Here's an interesting statistic. Unless you count the ages of early Biblical man, every 110 year period has had the same identical mortality rate; 100%.

Empath, your observations astound me. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif Please continue.

Well, 2dogs, humankind's trip through this adventure is like a large mine field that stretches as far as you can see, and salted effectively with enough mines and sink holes that no one can be expected to make it to the other side. We might march a constant parade across the field. We might even take note of where particularly bad trouble spots are. But still, as we set off across, no matter how well marked or what we observe of those going before, we all still get blown to bits or sink into oblivion. No one survives, all hands are lost.

Mortality rates must be considered only in regard to particular circumstances and quite small periods of time. Otherwise, we are literally dropping like flies.

Time to get some sleep. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/sleepy.gif

If God's will, I'll awaken in the morning. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif