‘Zombie facts’ live on after black plastic and other studies get corrected or retracted [Video]

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Headlines warning people to throw out their black plastic kitchen utensils live on, as do social media posts warning of “secret toxins” in your kitchen.

Less prominent? A correction to the peer-reviewed study those headlines were based on.

In October, the journal Chemosphere published a study by researchers in the U.S. and Netherlands that found brominated fire retardants (BFR) in black plastic household products sold in the U.S., including kitchen items.

But there was a math error when the study’s authors calculated the risk — and it was off by an order of magnitude. 

The authors said they regret the error, but it “does not affect the overall conclusion of the paper,” as it was …