Teflon coatings on the pans and the myths around them

After I became a young mother, everyone I met considered it my duty to tell me about what is harmful and what is useful. In particular, it turns out that I have been exposing my health to dangers for a long time using Teflon-coated pans for cooking, as they “emit toxic gases” when heated. In this regard, the following argument is often made: in kitchens where teflon pans are used, parrots and other poultry often die. Accustomed to being critical of such statements, I climbed into the scientific literature in order to understand what kind of poisonous gas Teflon releases and why birds die.

To begin with, Teflon (or polytetrafluoroethylene) really decomposes at high temperatures and releases far from useful substances. These include, for example, hydrofluoric acid vapors, which corrode even concrete, and perfluoroisobutylene, which, by the way, is 10 times more poisonous than the gases that were used during gas attacks. But in order to reach temperatures at which Teflon decomposes into harmful components (above 300 degrees), it is necessary to try very, very well and purposefully heat an empty frying pan with a Teflon coating. Let me give you a concrete example: if you heat a vegetable oil in a Teflon pan, it will smoke long before the Teflon starts to decompose.

But why do the premises where teflon pans are used, do birds die? As scientists found out, Teflon has nothing to do with it. They conducted an experiment: they heated vegetable and animal fats in aluminum, steel, and teflon pans, and placed parrots nearby. As a result, the parrots died anyway, and the reason was not at all in the saucepan, but in the smoke from the burned oils, which, as it turned out, also contain little useful .
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In general, I calmly continue to use Teflon pans, since I probably need to make a fire in the kitchen so that the Teflon frying pan begins to emit harmful substances.