Industry campaign omits much of the story about BPA

Late last week I got another political flyer in the mail, this one with a full-page photo of a sack of groceries under the tag "Don't Let Sacramento Politicians Remove Products From Your Grocery Bag"

Open it up, and its a pitch to call legislators asking them to vote no on S.B. 1713, which would ban the use of something called "BPA," which the flyer says is "a material that's been safely used for 50 years in food packaging and a wide variety of plastic products like reusable water and baby bottles."

Curious, I hit the Internet and did a little Googling.

"BPA" is actually Bisphenol A, a chemical that's been the subject of much recent scientific research. The flyer said that "rigorous scientific reviews in the United States, Europe and Japan have all concluded that these products are safe for use."

Umm... no. The U.S. National Institutes of Health last year expressed [huge PDF file] "some concern for neural and behavioral effects" of BPA upon infants and children. Some research suggests that BPA can disrupts the body's hormones, especially in children, leading to an earlier onset of puberty among girls and lower testosterone levels in boys.

Canada, in response to recent research, recently classified BPA as toxic and announced a ban on baby bottles containing the chemical. Walmart already has pulled BPA-containing baby items off shelves in Canada, and announced that it will do the same in the U.S. next year.

So the research isn't as clear as the flyer would have the public believe.

The California bill would ban the use of BPA in baby bottles, sippy cups and packaging for food aimed at kids ages 3 and under. In addition to California, nine other states, plus the federal government, are considering banning BPA in products aimed at infants and toddlers.

And this morning, a full page ad appeared in the LA Times from the group behind the flyer, the chemical industry-funded "BPAfacts.org." Seems like this would be a good subject for a story in the Times, examining the bill and providing the facts that the chemical industry isn't in its ads. Unfortunately, the last story I could find in the Times about BPA and legislation came from last May.

Robert Niles also can be found at http://www.themeparkinsider.com