Perchlorate and Health

Perchlorate and Health

It is an accepted fact in the medical community that any effect the chemical perchlorate may have on the human body is limited to the thyroid gland.

There are no measureable human health effects from low levels of perchlorate.

There are no measureable effects when perchlorate is in the body at levels below 245 ppb. Because perchlorate is not stored in the body, any effects of high levels of perchlorate exposure are fully reversible once exposure declines or stops.

Exposure to perchlorate over a long period of time at levels above 14,000 ppb can cause thyroid hormones to drop. To put this in perspective, a person would have to drink at least 500 gallons of water with 20 ppb of perchlorate in each gallon every day before they could experience any adverse effect. Research by Lamm et al. and Gibbs et al. suggest it can take years of exposure at these extreme levels to pose the risk of adverse health effects.

Cancer Facts
The issue of whether perchlorate poses a cancer risk is a critical one, and one on which the science has been clear; perchlorate does not cause cancer.

Thyroid Facts
It is an accepted fact in the medical community perchlorate’s effects, if they occur, are limited to the thyroid gland, and that the only consistently demonstrated effect, “IUI” is not adverse.

Perchlorate is Not Endocrine Disruptor
Based on the science and criteria developed by the US Environmental Protection Agency, perchlorate meets none of the characteristics of endocrine disruptors.

Studying Perchlorate
In spite of the numerous differences between the rat and human thyroid, much of the early research to define the effects of perchlorate on the human thyroid studied the thyroid responses of rats.