Chemical Reactions

A baby bottle. A can of tomato sauce. That wonderfully indestructible plastic canteen you've taken on every hiking trip. Could they be hazardous to your health? It's possible. One of the chemical building blocks of transparent polycarbonate plastic, as well as the lining in many food cans, is a compound called bisphenol-A, and it mimics the hormone estrogen when it enters your system. A growing body of scientific literature suggests that bisphenol-A, also known as BPA, causes health effects ranging from cancer to infertility and obesity. The National Toxicology Program of the National Institutes of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) commissioned a full review of the compound, but the company they selected to do the work, Virginia-based Sciences International, had some serious conflicts of interest: Two of its largest funders, Dow and DuPont, manufacture BPA. The Los Angeles Times exposed the conflict, and NIEHS severed ties with Sciences International. Now NRDC senior scientist Jen Sass is working with agency officials to establish disclosure and conflict rules for contractors. Meanwhile, NRDC science fellow Sarah Janssen, who specializes in endocrine disruption, is reviewing the most recent draft of the report and plans to submit comments to the agency in early summer.