From
Environment & Climate News:
A comprehensive study by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) reports products containing the chemical
bisphenol-A are completely safe for human use. The new findings, released July 23, authoritatively contradict the assertions of anti-chemical activists seeking to ban bisphenol-A in cities and states across the U.S.
After extensive study, an expert panel of scientists found potentially negative health complications of bisphenol-A identified in laboratory rats are not applicable to humans. The rats were fed much more bisphenol-A than humans can encounter, and the human body metabolizes and eliminates bisphenol-A much more efficiently than rats do.
Bisphenol-A poses no health threats to even the most vulnerable of human populations, such as infants, the elderly, and fetuses, EFSA scientists concluded.
“Bisphenol-A is safe as commonly used,” said Dr. Gilbert Ross, medical director for the American Council on Science and Health. “Typical exposures to bisphenol-A do not pose a health threat to humans of any age.”
Responding to assertions trace amounts of bisphenol-A have been detected in human biomonitoring projects, Ross said such trace consumption of bisphenol-A poses no health risk.
“We all have bisphenol-A in our bodies,” Ross said, “but this means nothing as far as human health is concerned. Saying that something is in our bodies is essentially meaningless. Just because something is found doesn’t mean it is a threat to human health. There has never been any evidence indicating any human health threat associated with bisphenol-A.”
However, from
NEWSInferno.com:
In addition to its association with cancer, hormonal problems, liver abnormalities, diabetes, and heart disease, exposure to bisphenol A (BPA)—the chemical the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has deemed safe—has now also
been found to reduce the effectiveness of chemotherapy treatments, according to University of Cincinnati (UC) scientists.
UC’s Nira Ben-Jonathan, PhD, led the study that found BPA induces a protein group that protect cancer cells from chemotherapy. “Resistance to chemotherapy is a major problem for cancer patients, especially those with advanced or metastatic disease,” says Ben-Jonathan, professor of cancer and cell biology at UC who has studied BPA for over 10 years. “Finding out what contributes to that resistance can give us an idea of what to target in order to make chemotherapy as effective as possible.”
Researchers suspect that BPA could play a role in cancer because of its structural similarities to a cancer-promoting compound called diethylstilbestrol (DES). “BPA does not increase cancer cell proliferation like DES does,” she says. “It’s actually acting by protecting existing cancer cells from dying in response to anti-cancer drugs, making chemotherapy significantly less effective.” Ben-Jonathan’s team studied human breast cancer cells, dosing them with low BPA levels consistent with levels found in the blood of human adults. The team found that BPA is acting in cancer cells similar to the way estrogen does—by inducing proteins that protect the cells from chemotherapy agents. Estrogen’s protein-inducing action has been linked to chemotherapy resistance; however, researchers have been unable to explain why this resistance occurs in some patients with less estrogen. Ben-Jonathan says her team’s research has important implications for this subgroup of patients.
“Patients with less circulating estrogen—post-menopausal women, for example—can also suffer from chemotherapy resistance,” she says. “Linking BPA to this problem gives us one more avenue to explore in terms of preventing chemotherapy resistance.”
“These data,” study authors write, “provide considerable support to the accumulating evidence that BPA is hazardous to human health.”