Bisphenol A in Food Containers Unsafe for Infants, Young Children - FDA

Sunday Jan 17, 2010 (foodconsumer.org) -- In a January 2010 posting, the Food and Drug Administration presented an update of Bisphenol A on its website; the agency said that it is now concerned over the safety of the plastic additive in food packaging material.

BPA is widely used in baby bottles and water bottles. The chemical is also used to manufacture polycarbonate plastic, which gives the product a transparent look and is almost shatter proof; it’s used in the manufacture of sports equipment, medical devices, CDs and other household electronics.  It also found in an epoxy resin that is used to coat the inside of nearly all food and beverage cans, according to Wikipedia.

The FDA says the agency and the U.S. National Toxicology Program at the National Institute of Health have SOME concern about the potential adverse effects of BPA on the brain, behavior, and prostate gland in fetuses, infants and young children.

Until now, the FDA has refused the assessment on the safety of BPA by the NTP; after reviewing all of the research on the chemical, the NTP expressed some concern that tiny doses of BPA may pose a risk to infants and young children, ultimately affecting the brain, reproductive systems and behaviors.

In June of 2008, Dr. Norris Alderson, the FDA's then Associate Commissioner for Science told the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and consumer Protection's Committee on Energy and Commerce that the level of exposure is not high enough to cause any real concern.

Some studies showed the estimated exposure to BPA was much higher than estimated by the agency, but the FDA refused to accept such estimates saying that they were measured under unrealistic conditions.

Dr. Ted Schettler, director of the Science and Environmental Health Network was cited by Reuters as telling lawmakers in a congressional hearing that animal studies showed prenatal exposure to low level bisphenol A.  Even this minimal contact, according to D. Schettler, can change development of the prostate gland and breast resulting in higher risk of cancer in later life.

Later in October 2008, a panel of FDA advisers concluded that the FDA failed to properly assess the potential safety risk from bisphenol A; the agency’s assessment was considered to be inadequate at best, flawed at worst. 

The scientific advisers said in their report that the agency only considered the industry-sponsored studies that found BPA is safe while ignoring others that found there was a risk at current exposure levels.

FDA staff "considered, but rejected for various reasons, a number of potentially relevant studies,'' a subcommittee of the FDA Science Board said in the report, which was scheduled to be reviewed by the full Science Board on Oct 31, 2008.

But the FDA was cited by bloomberg.com as saying that the industry-sponsored studies met strictor scientific guidelines.

Andrew von Eschenbach, then FDA commissioner, was cited by the Dow Jones News Service as saying "Let me be clear: There's no shame for having" your hypothesis disproved.”

BPA at a level of 0.025 ug per kilogram of body weight per day could permanently damage the genital tract, according to a study in Biol. Reprod. 72 (6): 1344-51.

An Italian study published in the Environmental Research (October 2008) showed that maternal exposure to BPA decreased or eliminated the sex difference in certain behavioral responses.

Study authors Palanza P. and colleagues from the University of Parma also found "exposure of female mice to BPA in both adulthood or during fetal life altered subsequent maternal behavior."

A new study led by Yaoi T and colleagues from Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine in Japan and published in the Nov 21, 2008 issue of Biochem Biophys Res Commun showed that maternal exposure to bisphenol A affects two genes on the epigenome in forebrain of the mice.

The researchers suggested in their report that "epigenetic alterations in promoter-associated CGIs after exposure to BPA may underlie some effects on brain development."

A Harvard University study released in May 2009 found that participants who drank from polycarbonate bottles showed a two-thirds increase of BPA in their urine. It was the first study to show that BPA leeches into urine in substantial amounts.

A five-year study published later in 2009 in the journal Human Reproduction examined 634 workers in factories in China and found the workers in the BPA facilities had quadrupled the risk of erectile dysfunction and seven times higher risk of ejaculation difficulty.

BPA has estrogenic properties and it may affect the brain, reproductive system and immune system in men and probably also in women, according to a review published in 2008 in Reproductive Toxicology.

The review of 199 studies on the effect of low doses of BPA below 50 mg/kg per day in model animals found many effects of BPA are similar to that of estrogens diethylstilbestrol and ethinylestradiol.

Others studies have linked exposure to BPA to a range of diseases including heart disease, diabetes, liver malfunctions, breast cancer among others.

Some developments

On April 18, 2009, Canada became the first country to ban the chemical from use in baby bottles. On May 8, the state of Minnesota issued a statewide prohibition on the use of BPA, and on May 12, 2009, Chicago’s city council passed the nation’s first municipal ban on BPA-made baby bottles and cups.

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, along with the Attorneys general from New Jersey and Delaware, sent a letter in Oct 2008 asking 11 baby bottle and formula container manufacturers to voluntarily stop using bisphenol A or BPA in their products because of the potential harm to infants..

In March of 2009, the top six baby bottle makers stopped using BPA in their manufacturing plants. Mega-retailer WalMart and ToysRUs pulled BPA bottles from their shelves in April.

The article contains some content from reports released early on foodconsumer.org

Reporting by David Liu and editing by Rachel Stockton