It is sad to report, but researchers have discovered that women, female monkeys and female mice have major similarities when it comes to how bisphenol A (BPA) is metabolized in the body. I would have thought we had a lot more differences than that, but still it means they have renewed their call for governmental regulation in the USA when it comes to the estrogen-like chemical found in many everyday products.
If you think BPA doesn’t affect you then you are wrong as it is one of the world’s highest production-volume chemicals, with more than 8 billion pounds made per year. It can be found in a wide variety of consumer products, including hard plastic items such as baby bottles and food-storage containers, the plastic lining of food and beverage cans, thermal paper used for receipts, and dental sealants.
Excess estrogen can lead to Estrogen Dominance and all the unpleasant symptoms and conditions associated with that and the findings in the current study suggest that human exposure to BPA is much higher than some prior estimates and is likely to be from many still-unknown sources, indicating the need for governmental agencies to require the chemical industry to identify all products that contain BPA.
“For years, BPA manufacturers have argued that BPA is safe and have denied the validity of more than 200 studies that showed adverse health effects in animals due to exposure to very low doses of BPA,” said Julia Taylor, lead author and associate research professor at the University of Missouri. “We know that BPA leaches out of products that contain it, and that it acts like estrogen in the body.”
“We’ve assumed we’re getting BPA from the ingestion of contaminated food and beverages,” said co-author Pat Hunt, a professor at the Washington State University School of Molecular Biosciences. “This indicates there must be a lot of other ways in which we’re exposed to this chemical and we’re probably exposed to much higher levels than we have assumed.”
The danger of BPA is something I have highlighted previously, particularly in relation to children, and now there appears to be yet another cause for concern relating to dental treatment. BPA was originally produced for use as a synthetic hormone in 1936 and today is most commonly used as the building block of polycarbonate plastic for products such as baby bottles and water bottles, epoxy resins (coatings that line food containers), and white dental sealants. It is also an additive in other types of plastic used to make children’s toys.
To date there is extensive scientific literature reporting adverse effects of BPA at doses lower than the current level considered safe by U.S. EPA, a high rate of leaching of BPA from food and beverage containers, and evidence that the median BPA level in humans is higher than the level that causes adverse effects in lab studies.
Children, and Men Also At Risk
The hormonal effect of estrogen from BPA does not just affect women; men are not immune either as prostate problems are also associated with BPA.
Growing children are particularly at risk to chemicals in their environment because they face greater exposure per pound of body weight and are physiologically more susceptible to them. Children’s exposures begin at conception, as chemicals, including BPA, cross the placenta in a pregnant woman’s body and can affect the embryo or foetus during critical periods of development.
Now there is even greater cause for concern as, according to researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine, bisphenol A (BPA) is also released from some plastic resins used in dentistry. They found that this is detectable in the saliva after routine dental treatment and among the many risks associated with BPA are changes in behaviour, urinary tract development, and early onset of puberty.