Further calls for ban on packaging chemical
BPA is used in baby bottles to make them shatter proof and is also used in the internal protective linings for food and beverage cans. Some studies have claimed the packaging chemical can harm infants.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, who introduced the ban in the Senate, said that US consumers should not be used as guinea pigs by chemical companies while further scientific evidence about the potential effects of BPA is sought.
The launching of the legislation follows the recent move by chemical company Sunoco to limit its sales of the packaging chemical. In a letter to investors the manufacturer said that it is requiring its customers to guarantee that its BPA will not be used in food and water containers for children under the age of three.
In addition, six major US baby bottle manufacturers announced plans earlier this month to stop using the chemical.
But Steve Hentges, executive director of the American Chemical Council’s Polycarbonate/BPA Global Group, said the council and its members that manufacture and use BPA are committed to providing products that protect public health and safety, especially when it comes to children.
“We have and will continue to develop scientific data to inform credible, transparent scientific assessments of BPA so that the public can have the confidence it deserves in the safety of these products,” added Hentges.
The ACC, in its continued defence of the packaging chemical, highlights a safety assessment completed last year by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which concluded that 'an adequate margin of safety exists for BPA at current levels of exposure from food contact uses, for infants and adults'.
However, US group, the Consumers Union, recently called on the FDA to ban the packaging chemical in children’s products and food containers, claiming that the regulator has enough scientific data to support such a move.
And the FDA's assessment of BPA last summer has been criticised by scientists and US lawmakers, who claimed that the regulator, in its review of the chemical, should have included independent studies that had raised uncertainties about the effects of low dose exposure to BPA in humans, in particular infants.
