Canned Food Bottled Water and BPA

A can or two of Campbell’s soup and perhaps a few bottles of healthy spring water and fruit juices plus a few sundry cans of prepared foods and vegetables would be very common in our household pantries. If you have children chances are that you have or have had some plastic baby bottles. Food packaging should be above reproach, after all businesses wouldn’t poison us for greater profits, would they?

The safety of many of these items is in question because of the presence of BPA (bisphenol A.) Bisphenol A is used primarily to make plastics, and products containing BPA have been in commerce use since 1957. At least 8 billion pounds of BPA are used by manufacturers yearly. Most of the food and beverage cans produced in America are lined with an epoxy containing BPA. Does anyone remember when “tin cans” were lined with tin? Virtually all of the disposable bottles for soda and water contain BPA.

BPA has been in the news repeatedly since 2008 and it is stirring up a controversy. Since the 1930s, BPA has been known to be estrogenic, in simple terms BPA acts like estrogen in the human body. Estrogen is one of the female sex hormones and with the other hormones it regulates or helps regulate growth, development, metabolism, tissue function, sexual function, reproduction, digestion and even mood. In short, adding female sex hormones to the diet raises the risk of getting cancer by about 5% per year and BPA is a synthetic female sex hormone. Meanwhile, the first large-scale study of BPA's effects on people linked the chemical to an increased risk of Type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Other studies have linked BPA to developmental problems, male infertility and stroke. According to the World Health Organization; laboratory studies in cells and animals have linked the chemical to cancer, infertility, diabetes and obesity. Nevertheless, the consequences of chronic exposure in humans remain unclear.

The uncertainty in the issue comes because the amount of BPA that we consume from food packaged in cans and bottles is very low. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration position is that the chemical is safe in low levels. How much is “low?” in a study done at Harvard, with 75 volunteers, half of them were asked to eat a can of soup every day for 5 days while the other half ate homemade soup. After only 5 days, the group eating canned soup had 1221% of the amount of BPA in their urine compared to the group that ate freshly made soup. Is that still a low level? The FDA says yes, the amount of BPA we get is still safe. The FDA is under continual criticism for their links to business and part of the FDA’s budget comes directly from the industries they are charged with regulating. Is it any wonder that some of us want to disband these agencies? From the WHO report on the health aspects of BPA: Establishing a “safe” exposure level for BPA continues to be hampered by a lack of data from experimental animal studies that are suitable for risk assessment. WHO PDF Download:
Toxicological and Health Aspects of Bisphenol A

Food manufacturers and chemical companies have been using the uncertainty about effects to their own advantage. When it comes to corporate profits, health is an underdog, remember the fight over tobacco. It’s déjà vu all over again.

Lacking ironclad proof that BPA is dangerous, and government intervention, the issue is left to the consumer. We are being used as guinea pigs while businesses wait for conclusive proof that BPA is harmful. Perhaps we are merely collateral damage. Changing products to eliminate BPA will cost food companies money and it is up to us to get them to change.

A recent survey by Green Century Capital Management found that at least fourteen of the largest food and beverage companies in America still use the chemical bisphenol A in their packaging. (PDF Download) The fourteen companies are the companies that responded to a survey; certainly many other companies are using BPA but did not respond to the survey.

Only three companies out of the fourteen are developing safer alternatives to BPA but thus far only HEINZ has started using a different product. HAIN CELESTIAL, and NESTLE are the other companies working on eliminating BPA from their packaging. The companies that failed to develop safer alternatives are: Campbell Soup, Coca-Cola, ConAgra, Chiquita, Dean Foods, Del Monte, General Mills, Hershey, J.M. Smucker,
Kellogg, Kraft, McCormick, PepsiCo, Sara Lee, Sysco, Hormel, and Unilever.
Downloadable PDF report about companies still using BPA here: Environmental Leader

Industry representatives say it is not a simple thing to replace the BPA with another product yet, somehow other companies and countries have been making strides in removing BPA from food packaging.

Is it time for the government to step in and regulate where BPA is used? Should we follow right wing advice and eliminate the agencies? Can we rely on the benevolence of the free market to protect our health? The following countries have already banned or limited the use of BPA in some types of food packaging,
Belgium, Canada, China, the European Union, Malaysia. Sweden, Turkey, UK and Japan. Here at home some States are trying to ban BPA in some containers but the FDA is doing nothing. In 1998, Japanese companies started eliminating BPA by voluntarily switching to polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Where is the US on this subject? In 2010 the Senate was set to consider a bipartisan deal to limit the use of BPA in children's products. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif) said: The evidence against BPA is mounting, especially its harmful effects on babies and children who are still developing. I very much regret that the chemical industry puts a higher priority on selling chemicals than on the health of infants. I will not cease in my efforts to remove BPA from products where it can harm human health, and I urge consumers to vote with their pocketbooks by refusing to purchase products that contain BPA.

The bill failed because of lobbying opposition from the American Chemistry Council and others.

How has it come about that America is behind countries like China, Malaysia and Turkey at protecting consumers? After all, we are “Exceptional,” are we not? A sizable segment of our population wants to eliminate the regulatory agencies rather than reform and strengthen those agencies. The Supreme Court has decided that corporations are people and have the right to spend as much money as they want to buy free speech. Congress is awash in money from lobbying and even has the legal right to make insider trades in the stock market. If you were to make a stock transaction based on inside information, you would go to prison. If you are a Senator or Representative and you make trades based on inside information, you can make lots of money and it is per4fectly legal.

What can we do? Avoid canned and bottled foods from the companies that are doing nothing. Start buying tomato sauce in glass bottles. Stop buying bottled water and use a water filter instead. Stop buying canned soup and make homemade soup, it’s easy. Stop buying bottled and canned soda; you can save money and your waistline and you may even delay getting diabetes. There are plenty of bottles in the store that are labeled BPA free, use these to take bottled water with you and use BPA free baby bottles. Use frozen food instead of canned or better yet buy fresh at a farmer’s market and support local growers. You could even get radical and write to the offending companies, telling them you will not buy their products until they remove the BPA. The only language that business understands is cash and if we all stopped buying bottled sodas or canned soup for a day or a week, business will listen. We get the benefit of less toxic chemicals and less sugar in our diet. The OWS protesters have a point, our system is biased toward the rich and powerful and it is time to take power away from corrupt politicians, businesses, banks and lobbyists and give it back to the people.

The popularity of Congress is at an all time low.

Will you re-elect the same people or look for someone less corrupt?