Plastic--Still Confusing

I do so love Tupperware, and I've been stubbornly using it all through the bisphenol uproar. I've even been using non-tupperware in the micro--chinese food containers & throwaway storage containers.

But today i read an article in Rodale about a study stating that ALL plastic leaches estrogenic material. I needed to put my detective hat on to discover if this is truly so.

http://www.rodale.com/chemicals-plastic?page=0%2C1

RODALE NEWS, EMMAUS, PA—It used to be that people who just couldn't break the plastic habit to go plastic-free could at least rely on certain types of plastics, usually those labeled #2, #4, or #5 in the triangle of arrows on the bottom, because those plastics weren't made using bisphenol A or phthalates, the two chemicals in plastic that are known to interfere with the way your body produces and handles estrogen. But a new study published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives concludes that there really are no "safe" plastics, thanks to all the chemicals, additives, and processing aids that go into making plastic products. In a test of nearly 500 chemical containers, the authors discovered that nearly all exhibited some kind of estrogenic activity.

more from the article

WHAT IT MEANS: There really aren't any "safer" plastics, and it's hard to predict which ones will leach estrogenic chemicals into your food. As this study shows, different plastics containing different types of foods will leach chemicals at different levels. That's largely because there are so many steps and additives in the plastic-making process, says George Bittner, PhD, professor of biology at the University of Texas in Austin and lead author of the study. "A plastic item can subsist of anywhere from five to 20 chemicals, some of which are additives, which are incorporated within the plastic polymer but not bound to the structure," he says. Both the materials that make up the plastic resin and the additives can leach out of plastics, says Bittner, who's also the CEO of CertiChem, the lab that tested the plastics in this study, and a consultant for PlastiPure, a company that works with plastic manufacturers to produce estrogenic-chemical-free plastics. You also have mold-release agents and colorants that are used to make or decorate the plastics, adds Mike Usey, CEO of PlastiPure, and those colorants tend to be highly estrogenic.

Rodale didn't provide a link, so I spent some time tracking down the article--Here's the link to the abstract in the Journal of Environmental Health Perspectives

http://ehp03.niehs.nih.gov/article/fetchArticle.action?articleURI=info%3Adoi%2F10.1289%2Fehp.1003220

Chun Z. Yang, Stuart I. Yaniger, V Craig. Jordan, Daniel J. Klein, George D. Bittner

Abstract Top

Background: Chemicals having estrogenic activity (EA) reportedly cause many adverse health effects, especially at low (pM-nM) doses in fetal and juvenile mammals.

Objectives: To determine whether commercially available plastic resins and products, including baby bottles and other products advertised as BPA-free, release chemicals having EA.

Materials and Methods: We used a very sensitive, accurate, repeatable, roboticized MCF-7 cell proliferation assay to quantify the EA of chemicals leached into saline or ethanol extracts of many types of commercially available plastic materials, some exposed to common-use stresses (microwaving, UV radiation, and/or autoclaving).

Results: Almost all commercially available plastic products we sampled, independent of the type of resin, product, or retail source, leached chemicals having reliably-detectable EA, including those advertised as BPA-free. In some cases, BPA-free products released chemicals having more EA than BPA-containing products.

Conclusions: Many plastic products are mischaracterized as being EA-free if extracted with only one solvent and not exposed to common-use stresses. However, we can identify existing, or have developed, monomers, additives or processing agents that have no detectable EA and similar costs. Hence, our data suggest that EA-free plastic products exposed to common-use stresses and extracted by saline and ethanol solvents could be cost-effectively made on a commercial scale, and thereby eliminate a potential health risk posed by most currently-available plastic products that leach chemicals having EA into food products.

I have a few problems with this info--this is stated in the Rodale article

Bittner, who's also the CEO of CertiChem, the lab that tested the plastics in this study, and a consultant for PlastiPure, a company that works with plastic manufacturers to produce estrogenic-chemical-free plastics. You also have mold-release agents and colorants that are used to make or decorate the plastics, adds Mike Usey, CEO of PlastiPure, and those colorants tend to be highly estrogenic.

and this is the conclusion of the abstract

Conclusions: Many plastic products are mischaracterized as being EA-free if extracted with only one solvent and not exposed to common-use stresses. However, we can identify existing, or have developed, monomers, additives or processing agents that have no detectable EA and similar costs. Hence, our data suggest that EA-free plastic products exposed to common-use stresses and extracted by saline and ethanol solvents could be cost-effectively made on a commercial scale, and thereby eliminate a potential health risk posed by most currently-available plastic products that leach chemicals having EA into food products.

Somehow this looks to me as though these fellows are proving that all plastic currently being manufactured is unsafe for use, BUT, they happen to be able to make some plastics that are safe.

Aveda--saving the Amazon? Unfortunately not

Yawanawá Indians participated in ceremonial games and dances marking the arrival of Aveda executives.

MUTUM, Brazil—In a remote Amazon village a full day by canoe from the nearest road in western Brazil, Yawanawá Indians in grass skirts gather around a pile of urukum, a spiky fruit they use to make body paint, and pose for two photographers from the U.S. beauty firm Aveda.

The images will help Aveda, a unit of Estée Lauder, sell its popular Uruku line of lipsticks, eye shadows and facial bronzers that use the plant as coloring. The company can charge a premium for products that look good and, at the same time, help save the rain forest by giving the tribe a sustainable livelihood.

But there's something wrong with this picture. For starters, the Yawanawá don't produce much urukum. They delivered none of it to Aveda between 2008 and 2010. Also, urukum itself isn't as exotic as Aveda portrays it in a documentary-style video on its website. Best known as annatto, it's an inexpensive food coloring, grown commercially around the world, that gives products like Kraft Macaroni & Cheese an orange hue.

So not only is Aveda not getting its annatto, I mean urukum, from the Yawanawá, or helping the tribe in any way, but yep, that exotic Amazonian urukum can be bought in any bodega--don't you love it? Maybe tribal peoples were correct when they said that Europeans were stealing their souls when they took their pictures.

This excellent article by John Lyons can be read in full at the WSJ.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704570704576274682898376462.html

If this link doesn't work--the WSJ is a subscription online site--Google the title and you should be able to read it then.

Being in the cosmetic business in a small way, and sourcing all ingredients responsibly, & taking care to inform my customers when they are constantly bombarded by super crap like this gets me really tired.