More BPA in the “bad news” lately:

* The journal Reproductive Toxicology published a Harvard University study of 190 men that found correlation between BPA levels in men’s urine and damage to their sperm counts and DNA.
“Men with the highest levels of BPA had sperm concentrations 23 per cent lower than those with the least.
The results also suggested a 10 per cent increase in sperm DNA damage.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1300402/Gender-bending-chemical-food-tins-cut-male-fertility.html#ixzz0wj4otRNc

* Store receipts in many cases are loaded with BPA dust which rubs off onto your fingers. The Environmental Working Group tested receipts from a variety of stores and governmental units, and found large amounts. Stores with particularly heavy loads of it included Safeway and Whole Foods Markets, not to mention the U.S. Postal Service and the U.S. House of Representatives Cafeteria.
This is despite the fact that BPA-free thermal paper is now on the market, so these retailers don’t have to be exposing us to this.
http://www.ewg.org/bpa-in-store-receipts

Researchers writing in the journal Pediatrics Monday documented earlier and earlier puberty for girls in the U.S.  The researchers blamed obesity for the trend and outlined the health risks of it.

Meanwhile, authors Stephen Perrine and Heather Hurlock coined the word “obesogenic” and suggested in a new book that the obesity trend is caused by chemicals like BPA in plastics.

And others, like me, sidestep the obesity question and point out that earlier puberty for females (and later for males) is a logical outcome for a BPA-rich environment. BPA, a synthetic estrogen, is used as an additive in clear plastic bottles, as liner for tin cans, and liberally covers credit card receipt thermal paper. It’s in the tissues of every one of us.

Dr. Frank Biro of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center led a team that published its results in the journal Pediatrics on Monday. The team measured breast development in 1,200 girls aged 7 and 8 in New York, Cincinnati, and San Francisco. They compared results with those of a similar study made in 1997. As previously, they found wide disparity based on race, but they found a troubling trend of earlier puberty for all races.

The study found that at age 7, about 10 percent of white girls and 23 percent of black girls had started developing breasts. This compares to 5 percent of white girls and 15 percent of black girls in 1997. Therefore the number of white girls developing at age 7 had doubled, and the number of black girls had gone up by 50 percent.

The researchers suggested that obesity, now an epidemic in America, makes girls more likely to enter puberty earlier. What’s the problem with earlier puberty? It causes depression and may lead to earlier sexual activity. In addition, it increases the individual’s exposure to estrogen and therefore her chance of coming down with breast cancer, said the researchers in the Reuters news article.

To counter the obesity trend and therefore the early puberty trend, families should eat together and eat more fruits and vegetables, said Biro.

However, critics suggest that the obesity trend could be caused by chemicals BPA and phtlalates, both plastics additives that mimic estrogen. Stephen Perrine and Heather Hurlock in their book The New American Diet have coined a new term, “obesogenic,” to describe these to chemicals, saying they cause obesity.

Whether they cause obesity is up for debate, according to The Wall Street Journal editorial (Are Plastics Making Us Fat?, 08/13/10, p. A15). But it certainly appears to me that BPA, created in a lab as a synthetic estrogen, is pretty likely to cause early puberty in girls–and late puberty in boys.

Sources: http://health.yahoo.net/news/s/nm/us_puberty_earlier

The Wall Street Journal, “Are Plastics Making Us Fat?”, 08/13/10, p. A15

Image credit: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

A leading environmental group filed suit Monday against the Federal Drug Administration (FDA), charging it with foot-dragging in protecting the public from bisphenyl A (BPA). BPA is a synthetic estrogen used in food packaging, widely believed to be damaging to health, especially for children and fetuses.

The suit was filed by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, according to an article from Greenwire published in the New York Times.  In it, the NRDC charged the FDA with failing to respond to its October, 2008, petition asking the agency to block use of the chemical in food packaging.

Until this spring, the FDA had maintained that use of BPA is safe. However, recently it adjusted its stance and called for more research on the question. The research is expected to take 18 to 24 months.  In the meantime, BPA continues to be used in food packaging, particularly hard clear plastic bottles used for water and soda, and in tin can liners. In addition, it’s liberally used in the thermo paper that we all handle as merchant receipts.  The synthetic estrogen is found in more than 90 percent of Americans’ bodies.

Meanwhile, New York State acted to ban BPA in products used by infants and toddlers over the weekend.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2010/06/29/29greenwire-enviro-group-sues-to-force-bpa-ban-in-food-pac-79679.html

I like to write a lot about BPA, bisphenyl A, the synthetic estrogen found in soda and water bottles. The FDA has permitted its use, although that may be changing in the face of growing controversy.

Another controversial chemical accepted by many Americans is Aspartame, also known as NutraSweet. It’s in the diet sodas and other foods.  Now, there’s something the FDA should have banned long ago, too.

My sister sent me an article from the Albuquerque Journal dated May 9, 2009: “Artificial sweetener effective bug killer.” In it, Richard Fagerlund, “the bugman,” advises readers on issues involving getting rid of pests. Here’s an effective way to get rid of ants and mice: just put some powdered Aspartame in a dish, and they’ll eat it up and die. “It’s a very powerful ant and mouse killer,” wrote Fagerlund.

So it’s harmless for humans? NOT!  Now, doesn’t this make you question the usefulness and integrity of the FDA, which is supposed to be protecting us??

Source: http://www.abqjournal.com/cgi-bin/decision.pl?attempted=www.abqjournal.com/bugman/09221739bugman05-09-09.htm

Photo credit: Photo by Bill Halls http://www.flickr.com/photos/billhails/183562782/

I don’t know about you, but I am very tired of getting email spam about Viagra.

Apparently one reason for it, indirectly of course, is the use of BPA, bisphenyl A, in our environment: in plastic water and soda bottles, in tin can liners, and on our credit card receipts, and other places probably.  Everyone has some levels of this contaminant in their urine. Now there’s proof that BPA, a synthetic estrogen, is adversely affecting male sexuality, according to a study by Kaiser Permanente, a health care provider in California.

Searching for a situation where some men are exposed to relatively high levels of BPA while others are not, the researchers chose to examine 427 factory workers in China. The study group worked in a factory producing BPA or epoxy resin; the control group worked in a different type of factory.  Up until now, BPA studies have been limited to animal studies.

Researchers took urine samples and explained that BPA is considered to be a hormone system disrupter. They asked plenty of very personal questions of these men.  They also asked questions about other factors that could influence male sexuality, including demographic characteristics, “smoking, alcohol use, chronic diseases, exposure to other chemical and heavy metals, and occupational history.” The study lasted five years.

Results? A correlation was definitely found. “Increasing urine BPA level is associated with decreased sexual desire, more difficulty having an erection, lower ejaculation strength and lower level of overall satisfaction with sex life, researchers said.”

Source: http://www.dor.kaiser.org/external/DORExternal/news/press_releases/press_release.aspx?id=5718&terms=bpa+male

The Environmental Protection Agency is considering regulating BPA, bisphenyl A, the synthetic estrogen used to modify plastics such as those used in water and soda bottles. It causes cancer and endocrine problems, research is suggesting. Recently I found out that large amounts are used to coat credit card receipts, or anything using thermal paper.

March 10, the agency issued an action plan under the Toxic Substances Control Act involving:

• Adding BPA to the agency’s chemical Concern List.
• Ordering data collection on BPA in U.S. water supplies.
• Evaluating the reported disproportionate effect BPA has on children.
• Evaluating the effect on wildlife.
• Finding ways to reduce unnecessary BPA exposure and releases into the environment while further studies are being conducted.

I am happy to see this. Apparently 1 million pounds per year of BPA are released into the environment, and no one has been a watchdog for us. It’s about time.

Want to avoid BPA? Don’t eat canned food. Don’t touch credit card receipts. (I know, we have to touch them.)   And of course, don’t drink water or soda that has been stored in plastic bottles.

And where else are those one million pounds per year being used?  Somewhere else that impacts each of us, I bet!

Source: http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/bd4379a92ceceeac8525735900400c27/78110048d7f696d1852576f50054241a!OpenDocument

A recent study shows that bisphenyl A (BPA) exposure to a fetus early in development apparently causes more aggressive behavior at age 2, at least for girls.  BPA is a controversial compound, found in some medical tubing,  hard plastic water bottles, some baby feeding bottles, some dental fillings and sealers, food-can and packaging linings, and carbonless paper (the kind used for credit card receipts).

The study, by Simon Fraser University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, was published Oct. 6.  In it, 249 pregnant women gave blood at invervals which was sampled for BPA.  The children were evaluated at age 2 for behavior issues.

Results showed that BPA-exposed girls were more likely to exhibit aggression and ADD, while boys to a lesser degree exhibited anxiety and depression.

The children will be evaluated as they grow older to measure the continued effect of the intra-uterine exposure.

Source: http://uncnews.unc.edu/content/view/2944/1/

A blog called BPAPlastic.com posted an article recently about BPA contamination in the oceans. BPA is of course bisphenol A, a synthetic estrogen and carcinogen used to strengthen and condition plastic. Scientists have found BPA contamination in seawater and sand at the shores of several different countries, said the blog, and are working to investigate further.

Where does it come from?

The contamination “is thought to be the result of large amounts of plastic garbage that has been dumped into the sea. Although plastic is non-biodegradable, the chemical BPA will still migrate from this ‘plastic pollution’ into the surrounding waters. Another theory suggests, that Bisphenol A may also be leaching into seawaters from the epoxy resins on ships.”

This is alarming, if you ask me.  Let’s avoid bottled water, a prime source of BPA, and keep pestering the FDA to ban it.

Source: http://www.bpaplastic.com/plastic-pollution-in-the-ocean

The President’s Cancer Panel has taken up the BPA issue. I’m referring to bisphenyl A, a plastics additive that is also a synthetic estrogen, subject of controversy.

In a 200-page report that was issued yesterday, according to New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, the two doctors on the panel are calling for America to re-think the way we allow chemicals into our environment including our food.  Here’s the problem: 41 percent of us will be diagnosed with cancer at some point in our lives. That number is way too high. We shouldn’t be complacent about it.

The panel is recommending eating organic food, checking radon levels in the home, and microwaving food in glass rather than plastic. But it’s focusing on the chemicals in our environment.

“Only a few hundred of the more than 80,000 chemicals in use in the United States have been tested for safety,” the report says, according to Kristof.  “Many known or suspected carcinogens are completely unregulated.”

On the BPA controversy, the panel weighs in on the side of caution. “Studies of BPA have raised alarm bells for decades, and the evidence is still complex and open to debate. That’s life: In the real world, regulatory decisions usually must be made with ambiguous and conflicting data. The panel’s point is that we should be prudent in such situations, rather than recklessly approving chemicals of uncertain effect,” wrote Kristof.

Among the panel’s recommendations: filter your drinking water, and store it in glass or stainless steel containers.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/06/opinion/06kristof.html

I guarantee you’ll learn something from watching this video on bottled water, its environmental impact,  its hazards to your health, and its cost. Nine million gallons were sold in the U.S. in 2008. Did you buy any? I hope not!