{"id":204806,"date":"2025-06-22T09:43:18","date_gmt":"2025-06-22T09:43:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/204806\/"},"modified":"2025-06-22T09:43:18","modified_gmt":"2025-06-22T09:43:18","slug":"scots-river-has-second-highest-levels-of-fertility-harming-chemical-ever-found","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/204806\/","title":{"rendered":"Scots river ‘has second-highest levels of fertility-harming chemical ever found’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joint research by York University and Scots environmental charity Fidra raised alarm on contamination of ‘forever chemical’ TFA in rivers.\"kelvin\"Kelvin Bridge and the Lansdowne Parish Church on Great Western Road, overlooking the River Kelvin(Image: Getty Images\/iStockphoto)<\/p>\n

A Scots river <\/a>has been found to have the second highest concentration of a toxic chemical thought to harm human fertility ever found in the world.<\/p>\n

Joint research by York University and environmental charity Fidra has raised the alarm on levels of TFA (trifluoroacetic acid) in \u00adGlasgow\u2019s<\/a> River Kelvin.<\/p>\n

The \u201cforever chemical\u201d takes more than 1000 years to break down in the environment<\/a> and German government scientists recently pushed for the EU to classify it as toxic to \u00adreproduction amid growing fears.<\/p>\n

TFA was found in 31 of 32 UK rivers<\/a> surveyed by researchers, however the highest concentration of 78,464ng (nanograms) per litre was found in the Kelvin \u2013 the second highest recorded globally.<\/p>\n

Sally Johnston, chair of Friends of the River Kelvin, said: \u201cWe need answers on what is causing it and who is accountable.<\/p>\n

\"TFA\"TFA (trifluoroacetic acid) has been classified in Germany as toxic to human reproduction<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s good to get evidence because then we can action things from there. But the researchers<\/a> don\u2019t even know what the source of this is and it\u2019s multifarious.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are an urban river. Close to roads, it has been an industrialised river<\/a> in the past, it\u2019s a river that\u2019s in recovery. There were 55 working mills on the Kelvin at one point, so it could be a historical issue. But as a little group, we don\u2019t have the capacity to do chemical analysis.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnston said it had been a \u201cfrantic\u201d week for volunteers after the findings, with dog walkers asking if the Kelvin is still safe for them and their pets.<\/p>\n

But she stressed: “We’ve still got a beautiful river here with amazing wildlife.<\/a> It’s a good thing that people become more aware of things like forever chemicals.\u201d<\/p>\n

“We blindly consume and then we start to ask questions when they become meaningful to us.<\/p>\n

“So if this raises a bit of awareness and we can ask questions and get the right information, it’s ultimately about becoming more knowledgeable and then being able to act on that.”<\/p>\n

TFA, which may also harm unborn babies, has been found in drinking water<\/a>, wine and food, blood and breast milk.<\/p>\n

Only the record 140,000ng per litre found in the Neckar River in Germany<\/a> in 2016 is worse.<\/p>\n

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\"FidraFidra project manager Hannah Evans<\/p>\n

Of the UK rivers tested, only the Ness in the Highlands<\/a> had no TFA.<\/p>\n

Alistair Boxall of York University said: \u201cIt is likely levels in drinking water will be similar to those we found in some of the rivers. While there are methods to remove TFA from drinking water, these are very expensive and likely impractical.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe urgently need to stop \u00adchemicals like TFA at source so they don\u2019t get into our environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hannah Evans of Fidra said: \u201cWe\u2019re asking the UK Government to turn off the tap of these \u00adpersistent forever chemicals.\u201d<\/p>\n

Germany\u2019s Federal Office for Chemicals last month said TFA \u201cmay cause harm to the unborn child\u201d and \u201cmay impair fertility\u201d.<\/p>\n

Environment<\/a> watchdog Sepa said: \u201cWe are considering the contents of this report and will be engaging with the researchers to better understand their findings.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joint research by York University and Scots environmental charity Fidra raised alarm on contamination of ‘forever chemical’ TFA…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":204807,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5009],"tags":[748,728,1699,918,4884,712,82528,12550,16,15,12846],"class_list":{"0":"post-204806","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scotland","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-environment","10":"tag-european-union","11":"tag-glasgow","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-scotland","14":"tag-scottish-rivers","15":"tag-sunday-mail","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"tag-universities-and-colleges"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114726371716372939","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=204806"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204806\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/204807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}