State study found 99% of tested Clovis-area residents have PFAS in their bloodstream

There are more than 45,000 people living in Curry County — the majority of them reside within the Clovis city limits close to Cannon Air Force Base.

A state study found that, out of 628 Curry County residents living near the base, over 99.7% were found to have a trace of PFAS in their system, a group of toxic chemicals believed to cause cancer and developmental, reproductive and immune system issues.

The recently released study by the New Mexico Environmental Department evaluated blood work for residents living in Clovis and the area around the base.

Of the 628 participants, 14 were in the highest national tier for PFAS in their blood stream. People who lived or worked in the plume area — which begins in the southeast area of Cannon and extends roughly four miles out — had more than three times the national average level of PFAS in their systems.

The findings showed that nearly all participants had some form of PFAS, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, most people in the country have been exposed to PFAS — due to their widespread use and persistence.

“Many PFAS are found in the blood of people and animals all over the world,” according to the EPA.

State Environment Secretary James Kenney said it is nearly impossible to release PFAS from the body, and the chemicals continue to accumulate over the years. PFAS can cause specific types of cancers, like organ or kidney cancer.

PFAS have been detected in 722 military installations across the country, with experts citing firefighting foam — which often contains PFAS — as the largest contributor.

Officials initially detected PFAS in and around Clovis in 2018, which they attributed to water discharged by the Air Force base. PFAS have been identified at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque and Holloman Air Force Base near Alamogordo.

Holloman Lake, which serves as the wastewater reservoir for the namesake Air Force base, recorded the highest levels of PFAS ever documented, according to NMED.

State officials have been fighting in court since 2019 to require Cannon AFB to clean up the toxic chemicals that remain in the area today. In July, NMED sought a court injunction to get PFAS samples from Cannon after the military base did not allow NMED to retrieve any PFAS samples, citing a pending lawsuit.

Cannon AFB declined to comment for this story.

‘Heartbreak into hard facts’

The NMED study is the first time the state has looked into the effects of PFAS and how many people in Curry County are affected by the chemicals.

“While multiple public health and environmental programs across the United States have investigated PFAS levels in individuals’ blood at the federal and state level, no such systematically collected data were previously available for New Mexico,” according to the study.

Study participants volunteered to be a part of the blood testing and all lived or worked in the project focus area, which included the area “within 4 miles of the southeast corner” of Cannon AFB. Participants were eligible even if they had lived or worked there “as little as one day” at the time of the study.

Over a three-week period between September and November 2024, blood samples were taken and questionnaires were given to evaluate each participant’s exposure history.

The data “strongly suggests a correlation between Cannon Air Force Base’s PFAS contamination,” according to the study.

“The results put heartbreak into hard facts,” Kenney said. “This evidence of the harm the U.S. Air Force has done to its neighbors is a call to action to immediately address its longstanding, neglected, toxic PFAS plume that continues to expose the families of Curry County.”

Following the study, NMED will offer health screenings to address ongoing exposure issues and share public resources with the community and providers. NMED will continue to strengthen regulations to prevent future contamination and will begin remediation to start the process of cleaning up PFAS around Curry County.

“It’s abnormal for us to have PFAS in our blood, and we shouldn’t ever be complacent with that,” Kenney said. “We’re implementing a consumer protection bill that’s going to continue to eliminate PFAS from products that we bring into our homes and bring our families around, and that’s coming up later this year.”