BPA in baby bottles, Independent front page

[styrofoam]

Very detailed piece in today's Indy about BPA in baby bottles and why Britain doesn't seem to be doing much about it.

tinyurl.com/ya4gy7x

And...

tinyurl.com/ye8hr4w

but going back to the BPA issue, it could be banned outright here. It would take a while to switch to safe materials but it can be done, everything it is used in can be manufactured in another way. It's a classic example of the government choosing the cheapest means and not caring about the consequence to health.

Crumpette, using a deodorant with aluminum in once in a while is not going to kill you, just as using BPA products once in a while is not going to give you cancer. It is more a cumulative effect.

I agree that BPA (and aluminiun) should be banned.

Oh alright then but you are right neenz in that respect, BPA should be banned completely. The risk is very severe and who knows how many uses is too many.
The geneticist Hunt exposed pregnant mice to BPA with a very low dose just as the eggs in their female babies were developing. When those female mice grew up, 40% of the eggs were defective. 40% is rather shocking and has untold consequences on the offspring of those mice. This is only one small part of one small piece of research, there is much more.

It's been known for many years to be a poison and it takes a lot to get banned outright in many countries

Crumpette, the FDA resisted banning it for years and said "there is a large body of evidence that indicates that FDA-regulated products containing BPA currently on the market are safe and that exposure levels to BPA from food contact materials, including for infants and children, are below those that may cause health effects." www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/PublicHealthFocus/default.htm

Of course they have banned it now, to be on the safe side, and rightly so, but people shouldn't lie awake at night worrying that they have signed their kids' death warrants .

We must all have been exposed to BPA at some point.

Lots of mums will be really scared by this when there is nothing they can do to change the feeding equipment they used in the past.

No I don't want mums to lie awake scared but it's important not to ignore the issue, it has been suspected of causing harm for decades and the longer it is left and sat on as the mentality of.. well on it's own it won't do a lot of harm.. prevails, the more harm is being done. I'm sure I've been exposed to it on many occasions and I am still standing, but it is exceptionally toxic. I feel it is not my place to make people feel better, it's not my place to say anything but if anything I do post has any impact and influences people to change what they do and save future generations then I am happy.

lottie, sorry my mistake, but it's not only banned in Canada many individual US states have banned it in baby and child products, Denmark and France have banned it already, as will Belgium and Germany and many other countries soon.

I am Canadian and live in the uk. I avoid bpa in sippy cups and if I bottle fed would be doubly sure to avoid as heating bpa makes the problem worse

canada does not ban things hysterically , and it is telling that the govt was willing to annoy a wide variety of industries with the ban. At this stage it was not being clamoured for by the public either so govt was not responding to pressure.
www.hc-sc.gc.ca/ahc-asc/media/nr-cp/_2008/2008_167-eng.php

Given the choice why wouldn't you avoid something with so many question marks over it? This decision was made by health canada after expert advice, not lawsuits or public pressure. I believe the FDA in the us is following a similar course and the uk ought to.

You can buy bpa free bottles on amazon, baby born free is a good brand. Adults can buy stainless steel bottles from glögg on amazon too. If your plastic has a 7 in a little triangle on the bottom it contains bpa

An outright ban of course is the best thing but it should be banned here at least initially in products containing food and drink, for everyone, and of course anything for babies and children. If an element of hysteria is required to make a change then I think it's a good thing, and people do need to start opening their eyes to research and making informed* choices for their children.

TBH I think the manufacturers have well caught on to the public opinion now - most all the baby bottles I've come across recently have been BPA free. I was prepared for it to be a struggle to get them as it was last time I looked in 2007, but everywhere seems to have them in stock, even my little local Boots.

neenz the Avent VIA system pots and their sippy cups etc. always were BPA free (I used them, and I checked). In general it is the hard clear plastics that contain BPA, hence many of the new bottles are softer and often 'discoloured'.

It is true about not heating things vin plastic in the micro. Not sure about the freezer though.

We are all singing from the same hymn sheet - of course it should be banned.

But a product with question marks over it is not the same as one that is 'very dangerous'.

Thanks for the info about the no.7 - I didn't know that. So if it has any other number, it doesn't have bpa in? Or is it just no.7s definitely have it in?

Thanks for that Lionstar - what about tupperware then? Is it just the 'toughened' plastic that can't be mishapen that contains BPA?

No as far as I am aware it's not limited to toughened plastic, but is definitely in toughened shatterproof plastic. Any flexible plastic has another serious health problem in the form of phthalates, but I won't get started on them...

(hijack: waves at lottie) At least you made an informed choice though, as I'm sure you do a lot of reading/research of your own.. most parents though haven't got a clue that something on the shelf in boots could be harming their child. And really, nobody should have to make a choice like that anyway, health concerns have been known for decades now, and things are not banned for no reason.

Avent have now come out with BPA free bottles that are still plastic. I have thrown all my old bottles away and now am using these. I cant do anything about the past but I can about the futrue so will be more careful from now on. I do use an awful lot of tupperware though and heat thngs up all the time in the microwave and free
ze things in them. is it really that dangerous to store food in plastic tupperware?

I don't think it's under reasearched. And the real issue is not diabetes but the way bpa acts as a hormone disrupter and could lead to development if female sex characteristics in male children. I agree that there are obviously diabetes has more likely causes

no. 7 plastics contain bpa as do some no 3. Other numbers are ok. In my experience quite a lot of plastics in this country don't seem to have numbers.

Quite a lot of Tupperware type plastic is bpa free. The ones to watch are the shatterproof plastics that are almost like glass, like baby bottles or nalgene water bottles.

I agree completely with crumpette that the fact that this is not well publicized here prevents informed choice and requires people to be v proactive

Anything plastic unless explicitly stated otherwise is potentially very harmful, so yes tupperware's included in that. I store food in ceramic dishes covered over, I never use plastic. ''I can't do anything about the past but I can about the future'' is exactly what people need to be thinking

So are containers that say "microwave safe", not?

Anything hard may contain BPA, anything that you can squeeze may contain phthalates. There is no safe plastic that is not marketed as such. Plastic without a number on the base still may contain BPA/phthalates. Both serious endocrine disruptors.

Should have been banned years ago, it's called the "precautionary principle" which means in other words "better safe than sorry". Ditto nappies with crystals in, blackout blinds, other household products containing stain resistant materials and so on. The Women's Institute and the co-op have campaigned against toxic chemicals years ago, so it's nothing extreme, it just means we're all absorbing man-made household chemicals every day and they can be transferred through breast milk and the womb and bottles and other plastics.

microwave safe usually just means it won't melt/break if you heat it. Does not mean that the plastic will not leach toxins into your food, as it will.

I'm not sure I can afford to replace all my tupperware but I guess I will just use them to store food and heat up the old fashioned way in a pan on the stove. Never really liked the microwave. I do heat my dd's milk up in it though in a bottle. that cant be good

You can juust decant contents into a bowl!

lifeinthesun, leaching is worse when the container is heated, so if you heat things up in another way it's best, or you could transfer the contents to a container that is not made of plastic. Heating milk in a microwave causes uneven heat distrubution so some of the milk can be a lot hotter than the bit you test, so it's best not to do that as practice anyway.. and microwaves in general, now they are really bad.....

yes roary is right, just transfer the contents to a normal ceramic bowl for example