(Reuters) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday announced its first-ever drinking water standard to protect people against toxic "forever chemicals" found in many household and everyday items, and offered $1 billion to states for public water system testing, the agency's first major move to curb the cancer-causing chemicals.
The final rule will affect 6% and 10% of the 66,000 public drinking water systems in the United States and is projected reduce exposure to the group of 15,000 chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) for approximately 100 million people. It would avoid tens of thousands of deaths that have been linked to PFAS, according to the agency.
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