Bisphenol A (BPA) will continue to be a part of the US diet.
Today the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it would not ban the chemical from food and beverage containers.
BPA is a ubiquitous chemical that has been linked to a range of conditions, including heart disease, reproductive problems, behavioral problems and breast and prostate cancers. Scientists believe that it produces such a wide range of health effects in low doses because it mimics the hormone estrogen, disrupting human development and making it particularly potent for infants.
However, industry groups have contended that such conclusions have been derived from academic studies hindered by problems such as poor experimental controls, inadequate sample sizes or inappropriate methods. Nevertheless, Campbell's Soup announced this month that it would be phasing out BPA from its products, setting the stage for an industry-wide shift.
The FDA was forced to make its determination as part of a settlement to a lawsuit filed in August by the National Resources Defense Council, an environmental group based in New York. In a statement, the FDA said that the decision was not a "final safety determination" and that the agency "continues to support research examining the safety of BPA." Indeed, new data coming out of its lab at the National Center for Toxicological Research in Jefferson, Ark., indicates that dietary exposure to BPA in infants was one-tenth of previous estimates.
The lack of action is sure to rile environmentalists, but some researchers are staying on the sidelines. "My opinion is that it is prudent," says Scott Belcher, an endocrine-disruptor expert at the University of Cincinnati in Ohio. "There's still a lot of data coming out."
Indeed, the news comes at a time when the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) in Research Triangle Park, N.C., completes an ambitious, two-year, $30-million effort to evaluate the chemical and launches a new set of cooperative research agreements with independent scientists.
"I don't think the BPA story is complete," says NIEHS head Linda Birnbaum, who helped to design the BPA research program. "There is nothing in the new findings that would lead us to have less concern, and the concern is still highest for prenatal development, infants and young children." Birnbaum notes that the lower levels of exposure the FDA reports may be a result of the agency's ban, two years ago, on BPA in baby bottles.
Diabetes link
One of the major areas scientists have been investigating under the program is the link between BPA and diabetes, which has shown up in correlational studies. Beverly Rubin, a reproductive neuroendocrinologist at Tufts University in Medford, Mass., has now found that mice exposed to realistic levels of BPA needed three times as much insulin to control their glucose levels after a meal, which is a sign of diabetes. "It's worrisome," Rubin says.
Although much of the new work has strengthened suspected links between BPA and human-health problems, one rigorous study has come back with negative results. Because estrogens affect the immune system, researchers hypothesized that low levels of BPA could be harmful. So far, however, Paige Lawrence, a toxicologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center in N.Y., has not found that to be the case in mouse studies. "We turned over a lot of rocks, looked under them, and consistently saw little effects," Lawrence says. "I think it's good news."
Belcher, who is also funded by the NIEHS, says that the program was successful but the results are still too preliminary and mixed to lead to any firm conclusions. "I have 10 years of research sitting in my freezers and on my computers," he says. "We had the opportunity to collect millions of data points from this, and we are just beginning to scratch the surface of the analysis."
This article is reproduced with permission from the magazine Nature. The article was first published on April 1, 2012.
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6 Comments
Add CommentGoodness forbid we should ban a substance that MIGHT hurt us. This is not the American way! We must wait until there are generations of people with illnesses due to this substance before we take action. We must wait until our citizens are weak and ill, and the healthcare costs to treat them are high, before we do anything. And last but not least, we must wait until companies who have stockpiled this ingredient get to use it all up, so they do not encounter any revenue losses from having to throw it away in favor of something that does not harm us.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGod bless America indeed.
Well said young man! =)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHome canning can be dangerous as well. The radiation from the electric stove causes cancer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlastic food for plastic people. Proving once again that what is good for the real people is bad for the corporate people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy trust in the US FDA is non-existent. Crooked Bush appointees have not been cleared out. Our government is so deeply corrupt that it shamelessly subsidizes massive corporations while leaving poor citizens to die in the streets. Corruption blocks formation of a national health plan and there is no longer any reason to trust the pronouncements of any government agency in these United States of Corruption.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo, I look to Europe for legitimate information on this.
http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/pub/1829.htm
According to European research, humans tend to eliminate BPA from the body faster than lab rats. Studies suggest that BPA could increase chances for breast cancer and memory loss in men among other neurotoxic hazards. It is a greater hazard to development, so EFSA has ruled it be eliminated from baby bottles. FDA eventually followed suit after being castigated by consumer advocates.
Research on low doses is suggestive, not conclusive. There may be other chemicals involved in diseases presently correlated to BPA exposure. Nobody knows if its toxicity could be enhanced by combinations with other chemicals. My previous readings on the subject said that it tends to be leached out at a higher rate into acidic foods such as canned citrus, juices, and tomatoes. We buy tomato sauce in glass jars, fresh produce, and mix juice from frozen concentrate to save money and reduce exposure.
There are much higher risks to society than BPA. The absence of a national health plan results in untracked diseases spreading in the USA at a rapid rate. Nobody really knows what that cough or fever might be. Any criminal organization bent on mass murder could easily develop a disease and millions of Americans could be infected before our medical community has any idea that it could be something new or a biological weapon of some sort. Millions of US citizens avoid vaccination, either because of the expense or from wrongly believing that the vaccine is more of a risk than the disease itself.
Stupidity and complacency are more likely to sicken and kill us long before BPA has time to work its magic.
Follow the money and find out which food processors paid how much to each FDA voter favorable to them; certainly science was (again) ignored by FDA.
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