Plastic, Plastic, Everywhere, Everywhere Plastic-Drink to Your Health?

Notice the plastic top on the  glass milk bottle.

Have you ever noticed how a re-used water bottle becomes brittle over time? That is because the phthalates have leached out of it - and you have drunk them.

Have you Been Poisoned by Plastic? 

It’s all around us, and it’s poisoning us. Scaremongering, or the truth?

Research has shown that harmful compounds can leach from plastics into the food and drinks that we consume Chemicals in water bottles and food packaging have been linked to infertility and birth defects.

One problem is; that most of us are utterly complacent or even totally ignorant. Like sheep, following the good shepherd right into the slaughterhouse; many of us have long come to trust, implicitly, the commercial food industry and that our government??? actually tries, or is, to capable of, should they ever do so; set safe health wise standards. We’ve all, well most all; come to take plastics so much for granted that we just assume they’re safe. Well, they aren’t!

So, what exactly are these people learning? And, should you follow their example?

The answer is, not much. And, hardly.

For example, a 33-year-old former lawyer who gave up the profession to launch Bare Skin Beauty, her own brand of organic cosmetics, earlier this year; she is one of a growing number of people who actually believes they are turning their backs on plastic bottles, plastic-lined tin cans and anything edible that comes in plastic packaging.
She, and many more like her, have these beliefs because they have all failed to recognise much of the plastic packaging; or, exactly, what, all, is commonly packaged in plastics. The reality is, if you want to avoid biphenyl-a and phthalates is that you probably can’t.

• People, humans, are probably the item most commonly packaged in layers of plastic.
• Plastics are all around us, in compact discs, car parts, carpets, cell phones, the fabrics used in most clothing, computers, cosmetics, key-boards, floor tiles, beds, upholstery - the list is endless.

• "Paper" cups, for hot beverages  all contain plastic.
• Processors all pack soft fruits and vegetables in plastic insulation, to avoid bruising.
• "Butcher" paper has a film of plastic on one side, in order to make it moisture proof,
• All candy wrappers and snack food bags contain plastic.
• One thing you should notice, on a walk through the the Bulk Foods aisle of you favourite supermarket--all the bulk containers are plastic--it does not matter, in the least, what the purchaser decides to put them in, these food products have all been exposed to plastics, numerous times. 

Fortunately, during the past five years, public awareness has slowly very slowly, grown over concerns about compounds in some plastic bottles, food containers, and, some, food packaging. The compounds on which most concerns have focused are biphenyl-a (commonly known, mostly in North America as BPA), which is used in tough polycarbonate products, and in epoxy resins that line rarely “tin” usually galvanised or aluminium cans, and a group of plastic softeners called phthalates.

Research has shown that these compounds can and do leach from plastics into the food (including all “fresh” and highly processed-like ground meat/hamburger) meats now sold in North American Supermarkets, and all the drinks (soft, hard, milk, juice, and bottled water; that we consume - more so if they are heated to high temperatures; which should raise additional concerns not about the kinds of plastics that are used as containers in microwave ovens but freezer/oven braising bags as well.

So prevalent is biphenyl that tests by the United States of the Americas Centres for Disease Control and Prevention in 2004 found it in 93 per cent 93% of urine samples taken from a group of 2,517 people.

Furthermore, a landmark report on biphenyl-a published in 2008 by the United states of the Americas National Toxicology Program concluded that there were concerns over biphenyl-a’s effects on the brain, behaviour and prostate gland development in foetuses, infants and children. It also found that because of the ratio of body weight to exposure, the highest estimated daily intake of Bisphenol A in the general population occurs in infants and children. This is because if a man of 180lb and an infant weighing 20lb ingested 5mg, the infant would have taken in more of the substance than the man, relative to their size.

Such concerns also extend to phthalates - there are 25 different kinds and several are already banned in children’s toys in the European Union/United Kingdom and for certain types of food packaging. Laboratory tests on rats and mice have found that some male offspring of females exposed to phthalates suffered birth defects and sexual development problems; but, so far, when larger mammals (man, as with meat packaging and “real meat” added by-products ‘pink slime’) were tested, the results could not be duplicated. One fact has been proven in tests in several developed countries, including Denmark and Israel, is that male fertility rates have fallen by about a half and rates of testicular cancer have soared since the use of plastics became widespread after World War II. Is this a coincidence, or cause and effect?

Breast Cancer, United Kingdom, believes something is clearly wrong. It was at the forefront of a successful campaign to have baby-feeding bottles containing biphenyl-a banned in the European Union this year. Now it wants the ban extended. 

Minuscule amounts can make an impact and many studies have found evidence that they affect the development of foetuses in the womb.

Scientists say that environmental oestrogen can act as an “endocrine disrupter”, which means it can affect sexual development, leading to breast, prostate and testicular cancer, reduced levels of fertility, and undescended testes. In polluted rivers, it has lead to fish and mollusks actually changing sex from male to female. The problem is that not all studies have found evidence of this.

Over the past few decades an estimated $300 million has been spent on research; resulting in the publication of more than 5,000 papers. The Food Industry, most Government

Bureaucracy, and, Many Research Scientists; are still arguing, over whether or not it is harmful. For the government’s National Cancer; or any other, Plan to be effective, ministers must look beyond lifestyle choices as the cause of soaring cancer rates and consider our routine exposure to chemicals and/or other potentially harmful substances.

If you see plastic that is soft and pliable, then it is because of phthalates. Have you ever noticed how a re-used water bottle becomes brittle over time? That is because the phthalates have leached out of it - and you have drunk them.

Of course, the food processing and chemicals/plastics industries say time has proven that their products are safe; after all just as no one has yet reported dyeing from Canadian E- coli contaminated foods; no one has reported dyeing from plastic poisoning. The British Plastics Federation says: biphenyl-a and phthalates have been the subject of extensive scientific testing and governmental reviews worldwide. “Based on the overwhelming weight of evidence, these assessments have consistently concluded that human exposure levels to both compounds are low and within the safe limits set by government authorities”.

At present, the only real recourse; we could avoid all commercially processed and packaged meals, tinned food and canned drinks. We could use only fresh (home grown, build a large, green house, farmers and commercial packers all use plastic packaging) produce and freshly squeezed(using ceramic, glass, or stainless steel)fruit juice instead. Lastly, we could fire all existing governments and then hire competent people, willing to actually DO the job they were hired to do (thus avoiding the huge cost of elections) - regardless of whether the dangers of plastic containers are real or imagined, these solutions could or can only do us all some real indisputable- no need for further research or scams-good.© Al (Alex-Alexander) D Girvan. All rights reserved