Articles
La EFSA reduce el nivel seguro de exposición al ATF en la cadena alimentaria
La autoridad europea de seguridad alimentaria ha reducido la ingesta diaria admisible de ácido trifluoroacético tras revisar nuevas evidencias, mientras continúan la vigilancia y el trabajo regulatorio.
On 22 July 2026, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) published a new assessment of trifluoroacetic acid (TFA), a chemical that can form when some per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) break down. EFSA says TFA can reach groundwater, soil and food crops, and that the European Commission and EU Member States will take the updated values into account when discussing measures to protect consumers.
This is a food-chain risk assessment, not a recall notice or a warning that a particular ingredient in a home kitchen is unsafe. The useful distinction is between a health-based guidance value and a measurement of TFA in an individual food. EFSA’s announcement updates the former; it does not identify a food that cooks should remove from their cupboards.
What EFSA changed
EFSA’s experts lowered the acceptable daily intake (ADI) for TFA to 0.014 milligrams per kilogram of body weight per day, from the previous value of 0.05 milligrams. The new ADI is about 3.5 times lower than the previous value. EFSA also set an acute reference dose of 0.07 milligrams per kilogram of body weight for short-term exposure assessment.
These values are tools used in risk assessment. The update is based on new evidence that included effects on thyroxine, a hormone produced by the thyroid gland. EFSA also says that the assessment leaves areas for further research, including possible long-term toxicity, carcinogenicity and developmental immunotoxicity.
How TFA gets into the food-safety conversation
TFA has multiple possible sources. EFSA says it can form when PFAS substances break down, including from certain active substances in pesticides. Because TFA may move through water and soil, the authority describes monitoring at more than one point: EU Member States are required to monitor PFAS levels in drinking water, while other programmes track PFAS in food.
For a home cook, that means the relevant decisions sit mainly with regulators, water authorities and food-safety monitoring programmes. There is no new cooking temperature, rinsing method or ingredient substitution in this announcement. It would be misleading to turn a regulatory update into a kitchen rule that EFSA did not issue.
What happens next
EFSA says its work forms part of wider EU efforts to assess and manage PFAS, together with bodies such as the European Chemicals Agency. EFSA and ECHA are examining how PFAS pesticides break down into TFA and what happens to it in soil and water. For consumers, the practical step is to follow food and drinking-water notices from the relevant national authorities rather than infer a risk from the name of a single chemical.
The assessment was informed by EU country data, previous EFSA work, studies considered by ECHA and industry data. EFSA also reports that it considered all 177 comments received during its public consultation. The result is a change to the values used for protection decisions, alongside a continuing programme of monitoring and research.
Sources
Autoridad Europea de Seguridad Alimentaria, «La EFSA reduce el nivel seguro de exposición al ATF» (publicado el 22 de julio de 2026):
https://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/news/efsa-lowers-safe-level-exposure-tfa
Informe científico:
https://efsa.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2903/j.efsa.2026.10227