Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Continues Bisphenol A Exposés
In a continuing series on the purported health effects of bisphenol A (BPA), a chemical widely used in plastic food storage containers and metal food cans, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has reported that all of the 10 “microwave safe” containers tested at the newspaper’s request leached BPA when heated in a microwave or conventional oven. While food companies advise worried parents to avoid microwaving food in plastic containers with the recycling number 7 stamped on the bottom, researchers apparently found that even those stamped with 2 and 5 leached the chemical. The highest bisphenol A levels reportedly leached from a can of liquid infant formula and a plastic food-storage
container.
Food company officials apparently responded to the findings by claiming that the low levels leached are insignificant. According to the Journal Sentinel, several peer-reviewed studies show harm to animals at levels similar to those detected in the newspaper’s tests, which were conducted to determine BPA prevalence in a typical infant’s diet. “In what is believed to be the first analysis of its kind by a newspaper,
the Journal Sentinel found that an average 1-month-old girl is exposed to the same amount of BPA that caused mammary gland changes in mice. Those same changes in humans can lead to breast cancer.”
The tests involved new containers; the foods in them were replaced with a mixture of water and alcohol, a typical testing protocol. Bisphenol A experts reportedly said that such tests likely underestimated the amounts of BPA that would leach from reusable products and did not account for variables of fats and acids in foods that are more likely to encourage leaching. See Journal Sentinel, November 15, 2008.
In a related development, several bisphenol A studies were presented during the annual meeting of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. One reportedly showed that the chemical can interfere with the development of uterine cells, which could prevent the embryo from attaching to the uterus; another showed a small trend among women with measurable BPA, who sought to undergo in vitro fertilization, not to become pregnant. See Foodnavigator-usa.com, November 14, 2008.
