[twitter]Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Want to know why so many young girls are entering puberty around 10, when it used to be around 13 or 14? Want to know why so many teen boys can grow a full beard in Grade 10, when I could barely get peach fuzz?

Baby bottles. Specifically, plastic baby bottles laced with Bisphenol A (BPA).

They’re cute, they’re convenient, and they’re poisoning our children.

Retailers are making sweeping changes today in advance of Health Canada declaring BPA as a dangerous chemical. A dangerous chemical that appears in everything from infant food containers to compact discs.

It has now been linked to early onset puberty in children and breast cancer and prostate cancer in adults.

Health Canada is expected to issue a risk assessment this week that BPA is a potentially dangerous chemical, a move that could lead to some restrictions in its use, particularly for consumer applications that are likely to come into direct contact with foods or beverages.

The action by the Canadian government would be the first by any country to label the chemical used for decades in everything from baby bottles and the lacquer linings inside tin cans to dental sealants a possible health hazard. [Globe and Mail]

Avent, a leading manufacturer of baby bottles, tows the company line when asked if their bottles contain harmful levels of BPA by only saying their products meet government standards. Well, the government standards are about to change, and those bottles, in fact, DO contain BPA.

DO YOUR BOTTLES CONTAIN BPA?

Look at the recycle number on the bottom. 1, 2, 4 and 5 are better. 3, 6 and 7 are bad.

The Zrecs blog is fabulous. It has a lot more info to help you find other safe products. Back in February, they wrote the Z Report on BPA which includes this list of companies who produce BPA-free products:

Adiri | Baby Bjorn | Baby Cie | Babylife (Wee-go) | BFree | Born Free | Brita | Combi | DCI | Ezee Reach | Emily Green | Green to Grow | iPlay | Kidbasix | KidCo | Klean Kanteen | Medela | Mother’s Milkmate | Mud Pie Baby | Not Neutral | Nurture Pure | Obentec | ORE Originals | Prince Lionheart | Rivadossi Sandro (Trebimbi) | SIGG | Silikids | Skip*Hop | Steadyco | Thermos | thinkbaby
[Z Report]

ZRecs also has a text service where you can text Zrecs and the company name to 69866 and they will text back with BPA info on that company.

SO WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT BPA?

First off, learn as much as you can about BPA. Then, go through your cupboards and get rid of everything that might be hurting you, and your family.

One of the first things we did last week was switch up my son’s water bottle. We picked up a Sigg bottle made of aluminum from Whole Foods. Expensive as hell, but safe for my son.

There have been rumblings about this chemical for years, but many disagreements between the studies. But look deeper as to why the studies disagreed.

Dozens of studies by independent researchers have linked low exposure to BPA in animal and test-tube experiments to illnesses, such as cancer, that are thought to have an origin in hormone imbalances, although industry-funded studies haven’t been able to find the same effects.
[Globe and Mail]

Arm yourself with knowledge and make changes in your lifestyle. For your health. For the health of your children.

Here are some more tips from Green Living Online:

# Use a metal or glass water bottle
# Limit your use of canned goods or choose canned foods from makers who don’t use it, such as Eden Foods
# Learn how to cook your own foods that you typically buy in cans — like beans or chickpeas
# Choose soups, milk and soy milk packaged in cardboard “brick” cartons, by Tetra Pak and SIG Combibloc, with safer layers of aluminum and polyethylene (#2) that can also be recycled
# Use glass food storage containers instead of plastic
# Use glass baby bottles or plastic bag inserts made of polyethyelene, or switch to non-clear polypropylene bottles that are labeled with recycle #5
# Don’t buy canned infant formula
# Eat fresh foods in season to reduce your consumption of canned goods
# Buy or can your own foods in safe glass jars
# Stop using plastic wrap and plastic containers to heat food in microwaves. Ceramic and glass are better
# Throw out any old and scratched plastic bottles or plastic containers

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