California lawmakers considered -- but in the end rejected -- a proposed ban on the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) in baby bottles, sippy cups and infant formula cans sold in in the Golden State.
The bill passed the State Assembly in July and the Senate a month earlier, but needed to be approved by the Senate again in what should have been a non-controversial procedural vote. The last-minute defeat was unexpected and came as a shock to some consumer advocates.
"Once again we see children's health sacrificed to the cold altar of money and influence," said Renee Sharp, director of the Environmental Working Group's (EWG) California office.
"Apparently, the fact that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Toxicology Program, and several other states and countries around the world have expressed serious concern and/or taken action to reduce BPA exposures means little compared to how money talks in Sacramento."Under study
To date the FDA has taken no action against BPA but said it continues to study it. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) last year announced a new $30 million study of BPA's effects on humans.
The government study will examine the safety of BPA and could result in recommendations for further curbs on its use.
"We know that many people are concerned about Bisphenol A and we want to support the best science we can to provide the answers," said Linda Birnbaum, director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), in a statement last November.
Wide human exposure
BPA has been detected in the urine of more than 90 percent of Americans and animal studies have linked it with infertility, weight gain, behavioral changes, early onset puberty, prostate and breast cancer and diabetes. The new research will focus on low-dose exposures to BPA and effects on behavior, obesity, diabetes, reproductive disorders, asthma, cardiovascular diseases and various cancers.
Researchers will also see if the effects of BPA exposure can be passed from parents to their children.
In May Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-CA) introduced an amendment to the Food Safety and Modernization Act that would ban BPA in most food and beverage containers. The amendment is strongly opposed by the food industry, which had been supporting the bill up until that time.
BPA is widely used in plastic beverage bottles and in the liners of canned food. The chemical is valued within the industry because it makes normally soft plastic containers more rigid.
In California, disappointed supporters of the bill that would have banned BPA in children's products attributed their reversal of fortunes to intense food industry lobbying.
