Friday, March 25, 2011
Even 'BPA-Free' Plastics Leach Endrocrine-Disrupting Chemicals Posted By Dr. Mercola
Even 'BPA-Free' Plastics Leach Endrocrine-Disrupting Chemicals Posted By Dr. Mercola
March 25 2011
12,284 views Share316
Email to a friend : 292
PreviousPlastic containers and linings often leach chemicals into the surrounding environment. And some of those chemicals, like the endocrine-disrupting bisphenol-A (BPA) and phthalates, may be harmful to your health.
Manufacturers have even begun advertising some products as "BPA-free." But a recent study found that most plastic products leach endocrine-disrupting chemicals even if they're labeled "BPA-free!"
The scientists found that 70 percent of common plastic products tested positive for estrogenic activity, and that number rose to 95 percent when the products were subject to real-world conditions such as dishwashing or microwaving.
Time Magazine reports:
"BPA is particularly worrisome simply because it is so common. Nearly every American has some amount of BPA in his or her body, in part because plastics are so ubiquitous."
Sources:
Time Magazine March 8, 2011
Environmental Health Perspectives March 2, 2011 (Epub Ahead of Print)
Dr. Mercola's Comments:
You would think labeling a product "BPA-Free" would be some measure of protection against ingesting this toxic plastic by-product, but it turns out that tests on plastics using this label have not been conducted under real-world conditions like running the plastics through a dishwasher or heating them in a microwave.
In the "real-world", 95 percent of all plastic products in the study above tested positive for estrogenic activity, meaning they can still disrupt your hormones even if they carry a BPA-Free label. Even more disconcerting is the finding that BPA-Free plastics in some cases leached more BPA than the non-BPA free plastics.
Does this mean there is no safe plastic when it comes to storing or serving your food or drinks?
In a word, yes, that's what it means.
I suppose you could research exactly which five percent of commercial plastic products did not leach BPA in the study mentioned above, but my guess is you'll never be able to identify which products contain this very specific variation of plastic, because commercial products are not required to list details like that on their labels.
This is another study in a long line of scientific studies that highlight the fact that eating or drinking out of plastic containers will deposit residual BPA into your body, potentially causing a whole host of health problems that I will list in more detail below.
What is BPA?
BPA or Bisphenol A is a estrogenic plastic by-product used in the manufacture of polycarbonate plastics. It can leach into food or drinks from the plastic containers holding them. Canada in September 2010 declared BPA as a toxic substance, but to date no other country has followed suit, although BPA has been banned in baby bottles in Europe and the US (although they may still be sold in EU countries until June 2011).
BPA has been linked to estrogen mimicking compounds since the 1930s and has been widely reported in the media as being a suspected disruptor of your body's hormones. BPA's proponents argue that the substance does not accumulate in your body and therefore is not harmful, even though BPA has been found in 98 percent of all people tested in the US and is commonly found in the umbilical cords of babies in utero.
The suspected health hazards of BPA are many, listed in detail below.
BPA is Especially Harmful to Infants and Pregnant Women
Plastic chemicals are among the most potentially damaging toxins for a fetus, so if you're pregnant or thinking of becoming pregnant, now is the time to start limiting your exposure.
This includes BPA, which is an endocrine disruptor, meaning it mimics your body's natural hormones and can trigger major changes in your body. Of 115 published animal studies, 81 percent found significant effects from even low-level exposure to BPA.
BPA first caught researchers' attention after normal mice began to display uncommon genetic abnormalities. The defects were linked to plastic cages and water bottles that had been cleaned with a harsh detergent, causing BPA to leach out of the plastic. After determining how much BPA the mice had been exposed to, the researchers realized even an extremely small dose of 20 parts per billion daily, for just five to seven days, was enough to produce effects.
Some of the greatest concern surrounds early-life exposure to BPA, which can lead to chromosomal errors in your developing fetus, causing spontaneous miscarriages and genetic damage. And exposure to just 0.23 parts per billion of BPA is enough to disrupt the effect of estrogen in your baby's developing brain.
Again, if you are a woman of childbearing age or pregnant, you should be especially diligent about avoiding this toxin, because just like it sounds, .23 parts per billion is not very much BPA.
Other BPA Health Risks
No one is immune to the health risks of BPA. Research has linked BPA to:
Structural damage to your brain
Hyperactivity, increased aggressiveness, and impaired learning
Increased fat formation and risk of obesity
Altered immune function
Early puberty, stimulation of mammary gland development, disrupted reproductive cycles, and ovarian dysfunction
Changes in gender-specific behavior, and abnormal sexual behavior
Stimulation of prostate cancer cells
Increased prostate size, and decreased sperm production
Diabetes
Heart disease
Liver damage
As it stands, BPA is one of the world's highest production-volume chemicals and is widely used in the production of:
Plastic water bottles Tooth sealants
Plastic gallon milk bottles Canned foods and soda cans (most have plastic lining in the cans)
Plastic microwavable plates, ovenware, and utensils Baby toys, bottles, pacifiers, and sippy cups
Avoiding these items is an important step to limit your BPA exposure, and you can find even more tips in this past article.
Phthlates: Another Plasticizer Chemical to Avoid
Phthalates, or "plasticizers," are a group of industrial chemicals used to make plastics like polyvinyl chloride (PVC) more flexible and resilient. They're also one of the most pervasive endocrine disrupters so far discovered.
These chemicals have increasingly become associated with changes in the development of the male brain as well as with genital defects, metabolic abnormalities and reduced testosterone in babies and adults.
Phthalates are found in, among other things:
Processed food packaging Lubricant and adhesives
Hoses Detergents
Raincoats Beauty products like nail polish, hair spray, shampoo, deodorants, and fragrances
Shower curtains Toys
Vinyl flooring and wall coverings
The Bottom Line about Plastics
Plastics are everywhere in the modern world, and much of it is designed to either go into your mouth or into your children's mouth, or serve as a vessel for things that go into your mouth (food and drinks). A sensible approach to limiting your exposure to BPA and phthlates would be to not put things into your mouth that are made from or come out of plastic.
This includes limiting water you drink from plastic bottles, avoiding foods that come from plastic containers and never microwaving foods in plastic containers. Processed foods are notorious for coming packaged in plastic, especially foods that go straight from the supermarket shelf into the microwave. Another major source of processed foods containing BPA are soups and canned goods, which I also advise you to avoid.
By the way, never microwaving your food will also help your health in other ways as well.
A good replacement for bottled water is making your own superior quality filtered water using a point of use reverse osmosis filter. The few dollars this filter will cost you will more than make up for its purchase price as you safely make hundreds of gallons of pure water from your home tap – water that is much safer than any you can buy in a plastic bottle, and certainly much safer than the water that usually flows out of your home tap!
You can also store your superior home-based point of use filtered water in glass containers, which will not leach toxins into your water. For taking your water on the go, a good option is to tote it in stainless steel containers, which are available at many retail outlets. With a little work you can just say no to bottled water and all the BPA and phthlates associated with long-term bottled water use.
10 Tips to Reduce Your Exposure to BPA
To be fair, you probably can no longer completely eliminate your exposure to BPA (since it's likely in our air, water, and food, too) but you can certainly reduce your exposure dramatically.
The following tips will not only reduce your exposure to BPA, but also to many of the other dangerous plastics chemicals as well.
Only use glass baby bottles and dishes for your baby
Give your baby natural fabric toys instead of plastic ones
Store your food and beverages in glass -- NOT plastic -- containers
IF you choose to use a microwave, don't microwave food in a plastic container
Stop buying and consuming canned foods and drinks
Avoid using plastic wrap (and never microwave anything covered in it)
Get rid of your plastic dishes and cups, and replace them with glass
If you opt to use plastic kitchenware, at least get rid of the older, scratched-up varieties, avoid putting them in the dishwasher, and don't wash them with harsh detergents
Avoid using bottled water; filter your own using a reverse osmosis filter
Before allowing a dental sealant to be applied to you, or your children's, teeth, ask your dentist to verify that it does not contain BPA
In the event that you do opt to use plastic containers for your food, be sure to avoid those marked on the bottom with the recycling label No. 7, or the letters PC, as these varieties are most likely to contain BPA.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Fukushima Nuclear Catastrophe:A Message from Dr. Rosalie Bertell
Fukushima Nuclear Catastrophe:
A Message from Dr. Rosalie Bertell
Dr. Rosalie Bertell
3-24-11
Dear Friends and Residents of this interdependent global home:
I cannot give magical answers to everyone's needs at this time of crisis with the Japanese nuclear disaster. However, I can give you a few tips on how to listen to the official "expert" statements given on CNN or NHK or other networks, plus some tips on what to eat or not eat.
First, there is a great difference between medical use of radiation, with direct risk and benefit to a patient and the random distribution of a comparable dose to a large population. In the latter case the risk is magnified and the benefit goes to filling some general society benefit. Hence, the individual harm may be sacrificed for the military or economic good of a country. How or why we must make this trade off has never been well understood by the public or well explained and agreed to by reasonable civil society.
There is also a significant difference between internal contamination with radioactive debris from a nuclear disaster and direct irradiation from an external medical devise under the control of a professional who can ask for your consent, limit the exposure and take care of any problems which might unwittingly occur. When internal radioactive tracers are used in medicine they have short half lives (both biologically and physically) and are not similar to plutonium, uranium, or thorium, or other debris found in nuclear disasters.
Nevertheless, both exposures can be significant, and require some consent by those at risk. Unfortunately, this prior consent is absent in a disaster!
Persons with good general health and good basic nutritional health will fare better when the food, air, or water is contaminated since the body normally chooses uncontaminated food when it is available to it. Avoid eating salads, if you are suspicious of them being contaminated by fallout or contaminated water; and always wash carefully fruits and vegetables to remove any surface contamination.
Do not take Potassium Iodide without medical supervision. The Iodine-131 has a short half-life, and probably will not travel very far from the source unless the release from the reactor is explosive. If there is radioactive Iodine in milk then there probably also is Cobalt-60, a very dangerous gamma radiation emitter. The inorganic Cobalt is incorporated into organic Vitamin B-12 in the udder of the cow and becomes much more dangerous to the liver when ingested in milk. Be careful to get sufficient rest so that the body can undertake efficient repair of any damage. Keep hydrated with the best water available to you!
Although it is true that alpha radiation, the primary radiation in early fallout, can be stopped by paper, when this same radioactivity is released inside the body it does about 20 times the cellular damage as the equivalent dose of X-ray.
I like to hold the food in my hands and thank it for its goodness. Then I ask that it protect me from any harmful contaminants it holds. I think this a sort of modern Prayer Before Meals, and not irrelevant under the circumstances.
I wish you well, and especially hold in prayer the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and all the other radiation victims/survivors of our world, for they are terrified by this massive threat which they hoped no one would ever have to suffer again!
Peace! Rosalie Bertell
"I have singled out the military as the key to quick 'surgical' actions; trying to resolve the social and environmental problems that are often directly related to their activities. (When I was invited in 1978 to a Japanese commemoration ceremony for Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors) I introduced the Japanese survivors to some American veterans, and it was touching to see them invite these 'enemies' to come to Japan as their guests. The Japanese honored their guests and new bonds of friendship, based on their common suffering and stronger than the hatred of war, were formed."
Rosalie Bertell. "Planet Earth: The Latest Weapon of War. A Critical Study into the Military and the Environment." 2000: pages 194-195.
A Message from Dr. Rosalie Bertell
Dr. Rosalie Bertell
3-24-11
Dear Friends and Residents of this interdependent global home:
I cannot give magical answers to everyone's needs at this time of crisis with the Japanese nuclear disaster. However, I can give you a few tips on how to listen to the official "expert" statements given on CNN or NHK or other networks, plus some tips on what to eat or not eat.
First, there is a great difference between medical use of radiation, with direct risk and benefit to a patient and the random distribution of a comparable dose to a large population. In the latter case the risk is magnified and the benefit goes to filling some general society benefit. Hence, the individual harm may be sacrificed for the military or economic good of a country. How or why we must make this trade off has never been well understood by the public or well explained and agreed to by reasonable civil society.
There is also a significant difference between internal contamination with radioactive debris from a nuclear disaster and direct irradiation from an external medical devise under the control of a professional who can ask for your consent, limit the exposure and take care of any problems which might unwittingly occur. When internal radioactive tracers are used in medicine they have short half lives (both biologically and physically) and are not similar to plutonium, uranium, or thorium, or other debris found in nuclear disasters.
Nevertheless, both exposures can be significant, and require some consent by those at risk. Unfortunately, this prior consent is absent in a disaster!
Persons with good general health and good basic nutritional health will fare better when the food, air, or water is contaminated since the body normally chooses uncontaminated food when it is available to it. Avoid eating salads, if you are suspicious of them being contaminated by fallout or contaminated water; and always wash carefully fruits and vegetables to remove any surface contamination.
Do not take Potassium Iodide without medical supervision. The Iodine-131 has a short half-life, and probably will not travel very far from the source unless the release from the reactor is explosive. If there is radioactive Iodine in milk then there probably also is Cobalt-60, a very dangerous gamma radiation emitter. The inorganic Cobalt is incorporated into organic Vitamin B-12 in the udder of the cow and becomes much more dangerous to the liver when ingested in milk. Be careful to get sufficient rest so that the body can undertake efficient repair of any damage. Keep hydrated with the best water available to you!
Although it is true that alpha radiation, the primary radiation in early fallout, can be stopped by paper, when this same radioactivity is released inside the body it does about 20 times the cellular damage as the equivalent dose of X-ray.
I like to hold the food in my hands and thank it for its goodness. Then I ask that it protect me from any harmful contaminants it holds. I think this a sort of modern Prayer Before Meals, and not irrelevant under the circumstances.
I wish you well, and especially hold in prayer the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and all the other radiation victims/survivors of our world, for they are terrified by this massive threat which they hoped no one would ever have to suffer again!
Peace! Rosalie Bertell
"I have singled out the military as the key to quick 'surgical' actions; trying to resolve the social and environmental problems that are often directly related to their activities. (When I was invited in 1978 to a Japanese commemoration ceremony for Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors) I introduced the Japanese survivors to some American veterans, and it was touching to see them invite these 'enemies' to come to Japan as their guests. The Japanese honored their guests and new bonds of friendship, based on their common suffering and stronger than the hatred of war, were formed."
Rosalie Bertell. "Planet Earth: The Latest Weapon of War. A Critical Study into the Military and the Environment." 2000: pages 194-195.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Fukushima Now 72,000 Times Hiroshima Radiation
Fukushima Now 72,000
Times Hiroshima Radiation
3-23-11
Dr. Chris Busby verified today in an email that three spent fuel pools are totally blasted away and burned up. That puts the approximate radiation levels at 24,000 HIROSHIMAS x 3 = 72,000 times the radiation of Hiroshima now in the atmosphere. Remember, this is JUST from the spent fuel pools. Radiation escaping from the reactors is another story altogether.
We have now all had time to evaluate what we believe is the truth behind the Japanese Nuclear Incident (or should I say disaster) and it has become clear that we have all been deceived by the Japanese Authorities, their nuclear establishment, the IAEA, the international pro nuclear groups and more importantly the so called experts that are invited onto the mainstream media channels to blast us with nothing more than total spin. We have heard from nuclear experts from Chatham House (the NWO voice box) and such people as Prof. Gerry Thomas from Imperial College London."
They all keep playing down this disaster without themselves fully understanding the implications on human health and the antiquated testing methods used in the assessment of potential victims. It is only when one listens to such people as Dr. Chris Busby that you get to understand the true picture of the side effects of contamination by ingestion i.e. depleted uranium etc.
Times Hiroshima Radiation
3-23-11
Dr. Chris Busby verified today in an email that three spent fuel pools are totally blasted away and burned up. That puts the approximate radiation levels at 24,000 HIROSHIMAS x 3 = 72,000 times the radiation of Hiroshima now in the atmosphere. Remember, this is JUST from the spent fuel pools. Radiation escaping from the reactors is another story altogether.
We have now all had time to evaluate what we believe is the truth behind the Japanese Nuclear Incident (or should I say disaster) and it has become clear that we have all been deceived by the Japanese Authorities, their nuclear establishment, the IAEA, the international pro nuclear groups and more importantly the so called experts that are invited onto the mainstream media channels to blast us with nothing more than total spin. We have heard from nuclear experts from Chatham House (the NWO voice box) and such people as Prof. Gerry Thomas from Imperial College London."
They all keep playing down this disaster without themselves fully understanding the implications on human health and the antiquated testing methods used in the assessment of potential victims. It is only when one listens to such people as Dr. Chris Busby that you get to understand the true picture of the side effects of contamination by ingestion i.e. depleted uranium etc.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
