I’m always cautious about the way the media presents these kinds of facts. About PVC, I just wanted to clarify that baby bottles and children’s toys are now PVC free. Since I can’t find the statement issued by the FDA on this topic, I thought that I’d summarize what I read before.
The following facts in bold come directly from the original position paper cited and the description of the methodology used to conduct the cited research.
About baby bottles and bisphenol A:
Bisphenol A is a chemical that is found throughout our environment, most of which comes from plastics. It is present in our drinking water, our bath water, our blood, and tissues. Testing of the ill effects of bisphenol A have come from laboratory studies on rats and other lab animals, and have been extrapolated to humans. In human testing, they have found that over 95 percent of people tested have detectable levels in their blood which are considered to be high, and are greater than those found to cause harm in LAB ANIMALS, namely rats. Further, HUMAN fetal blood was also found to have amounts higher than those found to be harmful in lab animal studies.
Our drinking water has levels at 5mg/L, which is also considered high.
For the purpose of this study, all bottles were incubated in water at temperatures of 80 degrees celcius for 24 hours, in order to simulate 50-75 dishwashing cycles using the SANITIZING cycle which brings the water up to disproportionately high temperatures.
Unfortunately, I can’t find the statement that I read from the FDA on this issue, but basically what I read was that the FDA commented that while Bisphenol A is present in baby bottles, the leaching of the chemical when used as directed on the instructions is minimal. Bottles are never exposed to the conditions as done in this study, and bottles would never be heated at such high temperatures for such a long period of time. Also measurements of the chemicals would be higher in bottles that were just heated, which is why bottle users are directed to allow the bottles to cool before using. Also, the amounts of chemical exposure have never been linked to disease in humans, but in rat studies, so they really don’t know what the exact effects of this chemical are in humans, and what the levels are that would cause harm in humans.
We and our babies are already being exposed to this and many other chemicals from the second they are conceived through our blood supply and the chemicals that we ingest. From what I’ve read, the chemical is already found at significant concentrations in our water- the water that we are using to prepare our children’s food and formula and that they are drinking already.
I remember a while back there was some terrible study published on the chemicals in human breast milk, including bisphenol A among a list of others. People became very upset about this, and the media tried to suggest that our breast milk was somehow contaminated, while we all know that breast milk is the best thing that we can feed to a baby. I think what it comes down to is that our world is contaminated, and we really can’t escape these things that are in our environment, our foods, and all around us. We can only make the best choices we can based on a risk-benefit analysis. I definitely agree that a better-safe-than-sorry approach is always best when possible. If you can easily use a safer alternative or adopt new practices to minimize exposure, then why not. But it seems like simply replacing worn bottles and avoiding putting them in the dishwasher is probably enough. (But that’s just my opinion.)
s&h’s mum2007-3-13 15:21:49
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My poor Reidun, we use Dr Brown bottles, and we heat her breastmilk in it twice a day (when I am at work, 4 days a week) and then give it to her to eat. After she eats, we put it in the dishwasher. I really didn’t know about this!!! This makes me soooo mad, a big warning should be on all these plastic bottles! And this should be all over the news!! 
. I believe all these chemicals (and other environmental issues) are leading to increased health problems–like these darn increases in allergies/intolerances!! Heidi T.2007-3-13 17:39:49
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