As we produce journalism that combats authoritarianism, censorship, injustice, and misinformation, your support is urgently needed. Please make a year-end gift to Truthout today.

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.

Seeking peace and quiet amid hectic careers, Sandy Wynn-Stelt and her husband Joel moved to Kent County, Michigan, in 1992. They picked out a home surrounded by woods and across from a Christmas tree farm, which Wynn-Stelt said was “about as Michigan as you can get.”

She was working in the mental health field. He was a social worker investigating child abuse. Their peace in the idylls of rural Michigan lasted 25 years, but ended unexpectedly. In 2016, Joel developed liver cancer and died within three weeks of his diagnosis. The next year, the state’s environmental agency found extremely high levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, PFAS, in the home’s well water.

The first test of the Wynn-Stelt’s water came back with PFAS levels at 24,000 parts-per-trillion, much higher than the 4-10 ppt limits the federal government would later set for the chemicals in 2024. It was such a high number local officials thought it had to be an error, but subsequent tests have shown numbers as high as 100,000 ppt for various PFAS, known as “forever chemicals” because they do not readily break down in water, soil, wildlife and humans.

PFAS are manmade chemicals that give the materials they coat heat-, water-, and stain-resistant properties. They have been used in consumer products since the 1950s, but since the chemicals’ risks for human health came to light in the early 2000s, public concern has grown — especially since PFAS can linger in the environment, seeping into and accumulating in people’s bodies from tainted air, food or water.

Michigan has been ahead of the curve when it comes to testing for PFAS and mitigating the issue in municipal water, but 2.6 million residents get their water from private wells. This means there are large gaps in the state’s ability to mitigate contamination, leaving residents with the responsibility to test and filter their own water. In such an industry-heavy state, these are important tasks—even in places residents wouldn’t expect to........

© Truthout