Same scenarios I'm exposed to Teflon; widespread use everywhere long before we know the safety profile. If it's effective, folks are going to want it in hospitals, school buses, hand railings at public places, elevator buttons, the works.
It took decades for the risks of PFAS materials to properly surface.
It depends on what's being compared. Anything that has a known negative effect that is intentionally suppressed in order to maximize profits all fall into the same category to me regardless of that the "it" actually is. At the same time, we have plenty of historical evidence where a new thing was thought to be the greatest thing since sliced bread and rushed to market only to be found that it is pretty nasty stuff. We can now test the new thing much more rigorously if only someone wants to spend the money and possible delay in profits which is no company ever.
That safety record says that copper dust/particles are definitely toxic to humans and there are plenty of instances of it getting into things it should not so I'm not sure what you are trying to say.
If copper found its way into everything as invidiously as pfas has, that would be really bad
The safety record says elemental copper dust is an irritant outside very large doses and acute toxicity happens at levels above a gram.
Copper is already everywhere at levels far, far above PFAS. It is found naturally in all plants and animals and it has been used for everything from coinage to water pipes for upwards of six millennia.
In other words, a material's safety may depend on the context in which it is used. I have concerns that a copper-coated nanotextured steel might, in some scenarios, have human health impacts; I'd rather not learn about it after decades of widespread use like PFAS.
> Our review of industry documents shows that companies knew PFAS was “highly toxic when inhaled and moderately toxic when ingested” by 1970, forty years before the public health community. Further, the industry used several strategies that have been shown common to tobacco, pharmaceutical and other industries to influence science and regulation – most notably, suppressing unfavorable research and distorting public discourse.
It took decades for the risks of PFAS materials to properly surface.