Last year, ACSH released a report highlighting breast cancer organizations that relied on flawed science and chemophobia to support the alleged link between environmental chemicals and breast cancer. The Breast Cancer Fund was in the forefront of those among the most toxic organizations, so it should come as no surprise that the group s latest report attacks the widely used plastic hardener bisphenol A (BPA).
Breast Cancer Fund researchers (and we use that term loosely) tested for the presence of BPA in six children s canned food products, including Campbell s Disney Princess soup and Annie s Homegrown certified organic Cheesy Ravioli and found (gasp) that the levels of BPA were a little higher than the amount previously found in baby bottles and water bottles.
How much higher? Hard to say, since they give absolutely no data. In any event, Who cares? asks ACSH s Dr. Josh Bloom, who aptly points out, Every scientific body worldwide has rejected the allegations that BPA poses any risk of harmful health effects at typical trace levels of exposure. This is, in part, because BPA is rapidly converted to an inactive, water-soluble metabolite that is excreted in the urine. Thus, it does not accumulate in the body.
This whole report is much ado about nothing, adds ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross, since there are no data to suggest that the levels of BPA in child-targeted canned foods or any canned foods, for that matter are dangerous or toxic. And, since BPA helps protect canned foods from contamination, it is to be expected that tiny amounts would migrate or as the chemophobes say, leach into the food. The mere presence of BPA does not mean it s harmful.