Health, Taken Seriously

The saga of BPA continues…

For those of you not up to speed on BPA, here’s a quick recap.  In the U.S., 7 billion pounds of BPA are produced annually.  Since 2004, we have known that detectable levels of BPA are found in the blood of 93% of Americans over age 6.  In April of this year, the National Toxicology Program (NTP) said their was “some concern” over the chemical’s safety, especially in children and infants.  Last month, the FDA declared that BPA was “safe.”  Last week, California voted against a ban on BPA in children’s bottles and sippy cups, while the NTP concluded after months of examination that indeed there remains “some concern for effects on the brain, behavior, and prostate gland in fetuses, infants, and children at current human exposures to bisphenol A.”

Then, a few days ago, research out of the Yale School of Medicine reported that BPA exposure, at the upper limits of the levels the U.S. EPA says is safe, had “a devastating affect on the synapses in the monkey brain,” according to Yale researcher Tibor Hajszan.  Previously, most BPA research had been in rodents.  But this study wanted to examine BPA in a species more closely related to humans and in a manner more similar to human exposure–slowly and continuously.  Researchers found that BPA damages synapses, the spaces between neurons that are crucial to brain communication.  Most of the damage was in areas of the brain involved in memory, learning, and mood. (For more on this, see this article on washingtonpost.com.)

On September 16, the FDA science advisory pannel will hear arguments on whether or not to restrict BPA in can linings, water bottles, baby bottles, and other food packaging.  “Unfortunately the regulatory agency charged with protecting the public health continues to rely on industry-based research to arrive at its conclusions, rather than examining the totality of scientific evidence,” says representative John Dingell (D-Mich), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committe, which is currently looking into the FDA’s handling of this BPA issue.  “The FDA’s assurances of BPA’s safety are out of step with mounting scientific evidence to the contrary,” says representative Edward Markey (D-Mass). “For the sake of the health of every man, woman and child in America, we should ban BPA in food and beverage containers, especially because there are alternatives already available.”

I’m anxiously waiting to see how this drama ends up playing out.