Posted on 05/06/2010 9:11:28 PM PDT by LouAvul
The debate is widespread. From googling articles I gather that the EPA says it is, Dupont says no.
What say ye?
Perhaps, if a person were to simply ingest large sums of it over a long period of time. But in the amounts most people are exposed to, I seriously doubt it.
Fiddle.
They had to invent a new glue just to keep teflon on the darned pot. If your gut isn’t as sticky, it’s just gonna pass right through.
“No more Metamucil, Ehthyl, I got the Teflon!”
Are you talking about teflon coated cookware?
Don’t buy cheap, thin non stick cookware and don’t overheat it and replace it if it starts to degrade. Replace it every several years.
I only use non stick for cooking eggs mostly. Buy good regular cook wear for most cooking and learn how to use it
You can use good cast iron skillets and they won’t stick if you season them well.
Teflon has been used been used on pots and pans as a non-stick coating for 30 or 40 years.
Can’t imagine that it could be that dangerous...
They don’t know if it actually causes problems in humans, but it does show up in blood and tissues and in the environment, it takes a long time to degrade.
I don’t know about carcogenic, but a teflon coated bullet will kill you through a bullet-proof vest.
So teflon will definitely kill you.
My first father-in-law went to the docotr for his black-lung check up (worked as a blacksmith in the coal mines for years down in Alabama), and the doctor asked him if he was having any intestinal problems. He told the doc he never had problems with his digestive tract because he regularly ingested a tablespoon of Vaseline with a biscuit of a slab of ham or a mug of hot coffee, or applesauce, or ... well, you get the gist. Doctor was shocked and told him that he should stop that, it would kill him! F-i-L was in his early seventies then. I really don’t know what he was diagnosed as having died from in his mid nineties.
Caste Iron cookwear is made near here in East Tennessee. It is now pre-seasoned for the customer, so it is done right. Greatest cookwear available, if you have strong hands and wrists.
My understanding is that the fumes from “heated” teflon coated pans can be fatal to pet birds. A friend related to me that their own parrots were found dead in their cage after an oven was left on with an empty teflon-coated pan in it. Or was it a friend of theirs? Anyway, it sounded like heating the pans empty can release harmful fumes and if it can be fatal to birds, what’s it doing to us? Do they still make Teflon stuff???
Teflon Kills Birds. It’s been known for many years that the gas it gives off kills birds.
Well from the deep northwest it may be similar to eating fresh okra .....you know the stuff you have to cross your legs to eat.....just imagine you know snot on a door knob but hey its better than sticking your tongue on a metal fence post at 30 below or for that matter a lawn mower exhaust
If you overheat/burn the pans they emit fumes.
If you keep birds they tell you not to use them.
If birds are exposed to those fumes they get respiratory infections that can kill them. (I know someone whose pet bird died this way)
I don’t know if they cause cancer or not but knowing what they do to birds I try to limit my use of them . (Canary in the coal mine type logic) I mostly use stainless steel or wrought iron but I do have one teflon coated pan that I am very careful not to overheat when I use it.
I stay away from the cheap ones too as they scratch and peel to easily (I don’t want teflon chips in my families meals )Good stainless last almost forever and well seasoned wrought iron pans clean up almost as easy as the teflon ones if you learn to clean them up right away. (oh and they last forever too )
Most likely, no.
It served Ronald Reagan very well, you know!
CA....
the important thing about teflon is it doesn’t stick to itself. It boils off when used on reentry capsules, but at lower temperatures it is a very stable salt. It breaks off of itself in very very small particles (smaller than pepper by about 100X). Because it is stable it doesn’t change the taste of food. It was developed in France for cookware, and adapted by NASA for space capsule reentry (not the other way around).
Here’s your first clue - have the personal injury lawyers started running commercials promising to win millions of dollars for you by suing DuPont?
I love cast iron and happy to support the American manufacturer, Lodge. It is a must-have for those prone to anemia, as it does add iron to the food cooked in it. I despise teflon.
Teflon can degrade and emit a gas the can kill birds, and make people feel ill if you heat it over ~500 degrees. Unless you are searing something, you rarely heat a pan that hot on a stove top. It isn’t carcinogenic.
I love Lodge cast iron - cheap and great for steaks, great for throwing in the oven.
I love teflon, especially for eggs, omelettes, and fish.
>> What say ye?
Can’t help you. My diet consists only of organic grown black beans and brown rice. I boil them by dropping hot rocks into a folded piece of birch bark pinned up with wood splinters into a crude little pot. The water is high mountain snow melt.
At night I dream of potatoes deep fried in really hot pig lard in a teflon lined aluminum pan. Take me now, Lord!
Yes, if you heat it with a blowtorch and inhale the fumes.
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