Bisphenol A: The Goods on a Bad Plastic
The leaked minutes from industry's bisphenol A strategy session in Washington D.C. last week tell a sad and scary tale of desperation.
Never mind that the estrogen-mimicking chemical bisphenol A (BPA) is on the ropes in Congress, in state legislatures and in the consciousness of worried consumers because of a growing body of scientific evidence that suggests this commonly used plastic chemical is bad for us.
Food and beverage executives and lobbyists for chemical companies and the food packaging industry are flailing about for a public-relations strategy to "prolong the life of BPA" -- committing $500,000 to developing a winning message, and going so far as to describe their "holy grail" spokeswoman as a "pregnant young mother who would be willing to speak around the country about the benefits of BPA."
The shamelessness of their shenanigans aside, BPA supporters seem to understand something about women and mothers: We get the significance of environmental health.
Maybe it's because we've learned how toxic chemicals that pulse through our own bodies cross the placenta and pass directly to our developing babies. Maybe it's because we know our breast milk, the very best nutrition for infants, is contaminated with BPA and notoriously bad actors such as the industrial compounds known as PCBs, the insecticide known as DDT and the flame retardants known as PBDEs. Or maybe it's because we're touched by the toxic legacy of diethylstilbestrol, or DES, an estrogenic compound routinely prescribed to pregnant mothers of Baby Boomers and some Gen Xers in the hope it would prevent miscarriages and premature deliveries.
Unfortunately, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the daughters of DES-exposed women are at increased risk for cancers of the vagina and cervix, structural abnormalities of the reproductive tract, pregnancy complications and infertility. And the sons of DES-exposed women haven't fared much better: they need to look out for cysts of the epididymis (the tube inside the testes that stores and
transports sperm).
In a creepy twist, a laboratory study conducted at the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) suggests that bisphenol A may cause similar adverse effects as DES. Indeed, female mice exposed to small doses of BPA while in the womb developed abnormalities in the ovaries and reproductive tract as they reached an age equivalent to midlife in humans. Among them: cysts inside and outside the ovaries, polyps, and excessive growth of the lining of the uterus.
Retha Newbold, the pioneering DES researcher who conducted the NIEHS study, said her findings suggest that bisphenol A could be associated with endometriosis and uterine fibroids, which are the leading cause of 600,000 hysterectomies performed anually on U.S. women.
This is just one of dozens of pieces of worrisome evidence about BPA to come out of peer-reviewed scientific literature over the past decade. I write about many more of them in The Body Toxic: How the Hazardous Chemistry of Everyday Things Threatens Our Health and Well-being (North Point Press, 2008).
Notably, the adverse effects seen in studies of lab animals exposed to BPA happen to correspond with recent trends in human diseases, including breast and prostate cancers, increases in urogenital abnormalities in male babies, a decline in semen quality in men, early onset of puberty in girls, metabolic disorders including Type 2 diabetes and obesity, and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder.
No one can say for sure that BPA causes these health problems. Nevertheless, there are ample reasons to take precautions with the use of this chemical.
It's been almost two years since a scientific advisory panel convened by the NIEHS raised the warning flag regarding the continued use of BPA in certain types of consumer products. The panel's level of concern about the effects of bisphenol A exposure on fetuses, infants and children was serious enough for a warning from the panel chairman that it may not be prudent to wait for scientific certainty (if there ever is such a thing) to take protective measures.
It was clear to me that day in an Arlington, Va., meeting room -- crowded with industry representatives -- that official actions to limit exposures were simply inevitable. Indeed, only a few months later, in April 2008, Canada took the first step toward banning baby bottles containing bisphenol A. This year in the United States, Suffolk County N.Y., the city of Chicago and the state of Minnesota have passed BPA bans. More are percolating in nearly two dozen states and in Congress.
Consumers already are demanding BPA-free baby bottles, sippy cups and reusable sport water bottles. And the marketplace responded by developing and introducing safer alternatives. Six baby-bottle manufacturers have pledged to stop using BPA, and retailers ranging from Toys R Us to Kmart have said they are phasing out BPA-containing baby bottles.
Yet, rather than get busy researching and developing safer alternatives to bisphenol A, companies such as Coca-Cola, Alcoa, Crown Holdings and Del Monte -- in addition to the North American Metal Packaging Alliance, the Grocery Manufacturers Association and American Chemistry Council -- are bent on manipulating consumers into accepting the status quo.
What's really got them worried is how BPA bans might soon expand from polycarbonate plastic
baby bottles and sippy cups to encompass metal food and beverage containers lined with BPA coatings. This, of course, would have broad consequences for the companies and lobbyists who participated in the bisphenol A strategy session.
Earlier this week, after the California Senate passed legislation that would ban BPA in food and drink containers designed for children ages 3 and younger, the American Chemistry Council issued a statement warning the bill "will do nothing to enhance product safety; it will, however, result in reduced product choice for consumers and needlessly more expensive food products." The rhetoric is straight out of the PR playbook discussed at last week's bisphenol A strategy session.
Enough is enough. The Food and Drug Administration is hard at work re-evaluating a Bush-era conclusion -- based on industry-funded scientific assessments -- that BPA is safe as used. After a consortium of international experts from academia, government and industry excoriated the FDA's findings as incomplete and unreliable, it's a safe bet the FDA, under new leadership, won't be so easy on BPA this next time around.
There's no disputing that BPA leaches from containers and cans into our food and beverages. According to the NIEHS, this is how we're primarily exposed to BPA detected in 93 percent of the U.S. population over the age of 6. These unfortunate realities are the result of too little knowledge and too few controls some 50 years ago, when BPA was introduced into commerce.
Based on what we know today, though, the industry's insistence that we continue to accept BPA in our food and beverage containers is just plain insulting.
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Hi Nena,
I just wanted to let you know you received The Great Green Post Award from Kate Pinnick for this article. More details and other awardees can be found here if you're interested: http://thegreenmomreview.com/2009/06/11/great-green-post-awards/
Best,
Janet Dean
In many ways we are a fast burning, young thinking and naive nation. We do not want to face the relationship between our choices over the last 50+ years and the dangers related to them. We wanted cheap, light weight and easy. The corporations still promoting and covering up this issue are not creatures with a heart and a worry. They are money machines. Clearly, we are settling for chemicals that infuse our daily lives and bodies with an overload that can manifest in sickness, disease, and disruption of our bodies. The marketing of the chemical industries' position will continue, unfortunately, until more and more of these type of positions are published, and the volume rises to the point that they can make even more money, or lose out, elsewhere. Nena, thank you for your persistence and factual reporting.
A fan.
If drinking bottled water is so bad for you than why does Dr. Andrew Weil recommend drinking bottled water in his book, "Healthy Aging"? (page 317).
Canada was one of the first countries to ban BPA from baby bottles because the evidence of its harm is as clear as see-through plastic. I thought that Nena was going to go in another direction with the DES story - because the two chemicals (BPA and DES) have an ironic history. BPA was first synthesized in 1891, and it was subsequently investigated as a synthetic estrogen in the 1930's . However, BPA was bypassed over in favour of the much stronger DES - whose sad legacy is still being shown in people born of women who took the drug. To think that one of the highest volume chemicals (about 6 BILLION tons of BPA is made annually - with 100 tons being released into the atmosphere) is actually a xenoestrogen strong enough to modify reproductive function is mind-boggling. Early puberty, hormone-dependent cancers, declining sex ratios and reproductive problems (like polycystic ovary syndrome) have all been linked to high levels and/or exposure to these estrogenic compounds. We are definitely in a precarious position, and ignorance is not always a blissful place to seek solace.
Back in October I wrote about how BPA was shown to interfere with the effectiveness of chemotherapy (http://www.aftercancernowwhat.com/2008/10/bpa-and-chemotherapy.html). Now I don't know about you but I've had 12 rounds of chemotherapy and any chemical that can make it ineffective is gonna be some strong stuff.
As to MocksNix - business has the right to do what they want to do but I have the right to informed consent. Being diagnosed with breast cancer at age 38 with a 17 month old daughter the last thing I want is her ingesting a chemical that mimics estrogen.
What's really happening here is industry is finally saying Time Out! Enough's Enough!
We are all sick and tired of busybodies interfering with our business and our life choices.
We are not immortal, we don't expect to be immortal, and the trade-offs for panicky health concerns or is costing us hard-earned yankee dollars.
If you search hard enough, you'll find that EVERYTHING is toxic!
What's really happening here is industry saying we don't care about your health tomorrow as long as we get your dollars today.
This is a classic big industry ploy; deny, delay, obfuscate; all the while filling their coffers with all the profits they can before finally giving in - in small, hard-fought steps. See the tobacco industry for the best example.
Your life choices are yours, to be sure. But businesses right to do business as they please ends at the point where it affects our health.
Dear Nena,
Okay. Between your article and several others (some as scurrilously written as the contents and attitude of the Coca Cola et co. tsk! tsk!) we have understood the problem. What I would now like to see is an article that tells us what the ALTERNATIVES might be to using products that contain BPA. Whose products don't contain nasty stuff? What kinds of containers should we be looking for and where do we find them? Give us a list of good stuff and where to buy it! Nothing speaks louder in America than the almighty dollar. If folks switch to products that are healthy--whatever they are--and even pay a bit more for the safety factor, companies will get the message.
I currently live in Germany, where almost everyone pays attention to safety in products, buys organic whenever possible--which is easy here and MUCH cheaper than in the US. There is an abundance of affordable organic food that even those much lower on the socio-economic scale can afford. Although it's difficult sometimes--even here--I CAN find bottled water in glass containers vice plastic and do see other kinds of packaging, especially in the organics area. If it's available and the message is out there, many people will make "intelligent'" choices, but they have to know what they're looking for and where to find it--which in America is often not easy.
It's called glass.
People choose plastic because it is light weight and cheap. People shop Wal Mart because they want cheap convenience. Health issues are of less concern to these people. Even when they are informed of the risks, the cheapness factor outweighs vague health concerns.
As for canned goods, the information is out there on the 'net' that will tell you which companies/brands use Bis-A free materials. Perhaps the author will provide links for those as you request.
Eden Foods is setting a great example. The company has been using BPA-free cans since 1999, and gets lots of props for it. http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/features_julieshealthclub/2008/06/where-to-find-b.html
To be sure, Eden pays a premium for BPA-free cans, and that cost is passed along to consumers. So, as I advise in my book, until BPA-free cans become the industry standard, try to limit the amount of canned food in your diet, and choose fresh or frozen foods instead.
Remember the Tylenol tampering crimes back in the 1980s? How Tylenol took control of the situation, pulled their products off the shelves and quickly developed tamper proof packaging? And remained industry leadership and goodwill in a tragic situation?
What is the major malfunction with packaging companies? What is the holdup in safe packaging alternatives, since there is obviously a market for it?
Great reporting and great information. Thanks NENA!
People up here in Michigan are a living petri dish! Back in the 1960's P.B.B. was accidentally mixed into animal feed. PolyBrominatedBiphynel is a fire retardent, but up here in the 1960's it became a food source that unfortunately fed right into the human population. We were assured (at the time) that there was no danger. Time will tell. I guess I tell this story because Nothing Ever Changes!
Why is it impossible for companies to just do the right thing? When will they learn that they will gain more business, more customers, and more money by acting responsibly and earning their consumers' trust?
It's hard to fathom, especially when you consider that Paul Anastas, "the father of green chemistry," who recently was appointed the head of the EPA's Office of Research and Development, says a viable BPA replacement can be expected in the coming year.
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