‘I Don’t Know How We’ll Survive’: The Farmers Facing Ruin In Maine’s ‘Forever Chemicals’ Crisis, The Guardian, 22 March 2022

In brief:

– Couple bought Songbird Farm in 2014. Grew and sold organic produce and grain.
– In 2021, discovered “their soil, drinking water, irrigation water, crops, chickens and blood were contaminated with high levels of the toxic chemicals [PFAS].”
– “Quickly recalled products, alerted customers, suspended their operation and have been left deeply fearful for their financial and physical wellbeing.”

Songbird Farm owners Johanna Davis and her husband Adam Nordell pictured with their three-year-old son.

Stoneridge Farm killed most of its livestock in 2019 because of PFAS contamination. Fred Stone was denied federal assistance for his tainted milk. “I don’t know how we’re going to survive.”

Public health advocates say Songbird is just the tip of the iceberg as Maine faces a brewing crisis stemming from the use of biosolids as fertilizer.

Fields of organic produce all over the country are fertilized with biosolids that are loaded with PFAS (and other chemicals that wasterwater treatment plants don’t remove). States aren’t testing for fear their agricultural industry will implode.

PFAS don’t break down. Not in the environment, not in our bodies. They are thought to be the number one pollutant right now:

1. Because they are everywhere: water, air, soil, food, livestock, our bodies,
2. Because they are so difficult to remove,
3. Because their health impact is horrific: cancer, thyroid and liver problems, immunosuppression, birth defects, among others.

While authorities drag their feet, the problem gets worse.