It's not like they didn't know.
One paper from 2019: "Kaolin alleviates the toxicity of graphene oxide for mammalian cells " and one from 2014 "Assessment of the toxic potential of graphene family nanomaterials". There are plenty moar where these came from.
From the 2019 paper: "However, graphene oxide reveals toxicity to some cell lines through an unidentified mechanism."
From the 2014 paper: Graphene, graphene oxide, and reduced graphene oxide elicit toxic effects both in vitro and in vivo, whereas surface modifications can significantly reduce their toxic interactions with living systems.
2019: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31534660/
2014: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24673908/