Food For Thought: Is there BPA on your dinner plate?

BPA. We all know it’s bad for us, but urine samples from studies show that roughly 90% of us have this chemical flowing through our systems. We take it in when we eat foods from containers made from BPA.
That’s not acceptable, folks.
What is BPA?
At its most basic definition, BPA is a chemical scientists use to make plastic flexible. It was first developed in the 1960s and it’s been used in everything from receipts and water bottles to the linings of metal cans and food packaging.
There have been no definitive studies done on BPA in humans to date, but we do know the following:
• BPA may act like a hormone in the body, messing with natural hormone levels. This is especially serious when we’re talking about the development of babies in utero and young children.
• Animal studies have shown a possible link between exposure to BPA and cancer.
• BPA may affect the behavior of young children.
• Adults with high levels of BPA in their bodies are shown to have more heart problems. (This could be unrelated to BPA, but it was a finding, nonetheless!)
• BPA exposure has been connected by experts to ADHD, diabetes, and obesity.
Folks stepped up in 2008 and forced companies to stop using BPA in baby bottles, sippy cups, and infant formula cans which is fantastic. But what about the rest of us?
Our friends in the federal government are looking into the risks of BPA but meanwhile, the FDA recommends that we take reasonable steps to reduce human exposure to BPA in the food supply.
How do you do that?
• Choose glass, stainless steel, or porcelain containers for food. When it comes to cans, if you don’t know for a fact they’re BPA-free, don’t buy them. Use frozen or fresh foods instead. If there are items in cans you can’t live without, do some research and find out if your favorite brands are BPA-free. Amy’s Products are now sold in Non-BPA cans.
• Do your own canning in glass jars!
• Do not heat plastic in the microwave because the heat makes the BPA leach out.
• Plastics with a 7 or 3 recycle code on the bottom may contain BPA.
Like I said a couple of weeks ago about the arsenic rice situation, I am not willing to settle for taking in just a little bit of poison, so I no longer buy food-related products containing BPA. Period.
Do you make a point of avoiding BPA? Tell us here!

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