Trashed – the experts

English: seal of the ecole normale superieure of cachan in france (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Trashed – the movie is out. One of the expert contributers is….

Dr Ana M Soto is a professor of cell biology at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston, USA, and a member of the Centre Cavailles for the study of history and philosophy of science at the Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris, France. Her research interests include the mechanisms of steroid hormone action, the control of cell proliferation, breast and prostate neoplasias, and endocrine disruptors. Regarding the control of cell proliferation, in collaboration with Dr Sonnenschein she developed evidence indicating that the default state of metazoan cells is proliferation. Regarding carcinogenesis, also in collaboration with Dr Sonnenschein she proposed the tissue organization field theory, which posits that cancer is a problem of tissue organization. Consequently, she is studying the role of stroma-epithelium interactions in mammary gland carcinogenesis and in tumor regression.

Regarding endocrine disruption, again in collaboration with Dr. Sonnenschein, she developed assays for detecting estrogenicity and androgenicity (E-SCREEN and A-SCREEN assays) and identified novel xenoestrogens. She is currently studying the mechanisms underlying xenoestrogen-induced alterations of the development of the female genital tract, the neuroendocrine system and the mammary gland. She has been a member of national and international advisory panels on Endocrine Disruptors and on breast cancer research. Dr Soto also works on the clarification of epistemological issues arising from the study of complex biological phenomena.

You might want to look at her work ….

In the meantime cut plastic from your diet with

the >>>A-Z<<< plastic free index.

How to

You can find out HOW TO …do all sorts of other things… plastic free right here

You know it makes sense…..

And she is cool too…..

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• Chemical “soup” clouds connection between toxins and poor health (nature.com)

B.P.A. Soup – oh yuck

B.P.A. Soup thats gross.

Heinz ‘committed’ to cutting health scare chemical BPA | News | The Grocer.

I am so glad I boycott tin cans

All about PVC

PVC is one of the cheaper plastics and consequently widely used.
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PVC is a polymer – a large molecule created by linking together smaller molecules.
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It is a combination of oil and chlorine. Chlorine is a salt, the same salt you use in the kitchen.
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Over 50% of the weight of PVC comes from chlorine which means PVC requires less petroleum than many other polymers.
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It is a thermoplastic material. It will melt when heated to a certain temperatures and harden when it cools.
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It is naturally rigid but can be made flexible with the addition of more chemicals including phthalates.
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PVC can be used in either form – hard or soft and is used as an insulator and coating for electrical cables, packaging, cling film, bottles, credit cards, audio records and imitation leather window frames, pipes, flooring, car interiors and to make medical disposables.

PVC is used massively in the building industry. Most water pipes are now made from PVC. They replace metal pipes that were less adaptable, more easily damaged and a lot more expensive.

PVC is known as the “poison plastic” because:

• Toxic chemicals are used in its creation.One of those is vinyl chloride monomer (VCM). VCM is a gas and a known carcinogen causing cancerous tumors in the brain, lungs, liver and various tissues in humans.
• Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) is a chlorinated plastic.
• Dioxins are unintentionally, but unavoidably produced during the manufacture of materials containing chlorine like PVC
• Dioxin is a known human carcinogen and the most potent synthetic carcinogen ever tested in laboratory animals.
• Burning these plastics can release dioxins.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Safe or lethal? The debate….

Lethal

Toxic chemicals are most certainly used in its creation one of those is vinyl chloride monomer (VCM). VCM is a gas and a known carcinogen causing cancerous tumors in the brain, lungs, liver and various tissues in humans.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), found that early-era PVC (manufactured before 1977) could leach VCM into drinking water to levels that exceed the maximum contaminant level of 2 micrograms per liter of water.
Dioxins, which are lethal, are released if PVC is burnt in a low temperature fire such as an open fire or house fire.

The green movement argue that the toxins used to make PVC endanger those who work in the industry and can pollute the environment. They also claim that the toxins continue to leach out over the products lifetime putting the user at risk.

Safe

Supporters of PVC say that in the beginning manufacturers did not realise the dangers of VCM and since regulations were put in place in the 1970s those dangers have been minimised. They also claim that now the product is safe for users the chemicals are inert and no leaching has been detected.

If PVC is disposed of properly, then there is no risk of dioxins being released. Though of course this does not answer for house fires.

The argument is made more complex when phthalates are involved. Phthalates are a group of chemicals added to PVC (amongst other things), to make it more flexible. These chemicals are toxins and are not bound to the plastic. This means they are able to migrate out of plastic into the surrounding environment. That they do this is fairly well established. Whether they do so in amounts that could be dangerous or not,  is not so clear cut – but I bet you can guess which side believes what.

For an interesting summary of the debate read this article from Mother Earth News

This is from a man who works with PVC in his family business

And this is from Greenpeace

PVC is not as easy to recycle as other plastics but it can be done. Though again opinions differ.For pro try reconvynal and cons go to Earth 911

There’s lots more on the different plastics and what they are used for  HERE

Find out about all plastic, the boycott  and us  here

Plastic Chickens Will Come Home to Roost

The grass verges of Kompot, Cambodia, are littered with plastic including chunks of polystyrene – that styrofoam to you Yanks.

Chickens it seems love to eat polystyrene

“Come on Pam” I hear you say “I know chickens are dumb but polystyrene?”

Hey – I saw them with my own eyes. And I had my camera. Here’s the proof…

Chicken thinks……”See white thing. Must be food. Break it down into smaller pieces. Yum yum yum”

Needles to say eating plastic is not good for chickens. They think they have had a good meal because they feel full but off course plastic has no nutritional value. Every year hundreds of birds starve to death because they bulked out their diet with plastic trash.

And it is worth bearing in mind that what goes into the chicken goes into you. Check out some not so tasty polystyrene facts right here

Plastic is implicated in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of animals.

This is why I boycott plastic.

Want to find travel related plastic free tips? Check out the travel category

Stay at home type? Check out my range of U.K. based plastic free products with the >>>A-Z<<< plastic free index

its why I dont trust plastic….

Image via Wikipedia

“Many consumers already look for commercial products that do not contain Bisphenol A (BPA), an estrogenically active compound that some manufacturers use for creating plastics and which leaches out of products over time (estrogenically active compounds are suspected to lead to birth defects, cancers and other health problems).

But BPA is only part of the story. For their study, the research team tested more than 500 BPA-free consumer products for other estrogenically active chemicals and found that 92 percent of the products readily leached the potentially hazardous compounds. Leaching was more common when products experienced ordinary stresses like dishwashing, microwaving and exposure to sunlight.”

read the full article

Related Articles

• Study: Health Risks from All Plastics May Spur Innovation (blogs.forbes.com)
• Barbara Ficarra: Are Plastic Bottles Toxic? (huffingtonpost.com)
• Producing Safer Plastics (usnews.com)
• Risks Associated with Bisphenol A in Baby Bottles (education.com)

Find  plastic free stuff  with  the  A-Z plastic free index

The clean can campaign

 

Image via Wikipedia

 

A month ago I emailed a lot of people about plastic lined tin cans. Why? Because increasing numbers of people are worried about the potential health risks of Bisphenol A (BPA) leaching from the liner into the food.  I suggested my friends  might want to check whether the food they were eating came from plastic lined cans – and then tell me the results so I could compile a clean can list.

Well…..the results were interesting.  Many people assumed (including me) that the white liner seen in some cans was plastic therefore those without the white liner were plastic free. Hienz for example came in regularly as plastic free. So I checked up and phoned their customer help line – all their products have a BPA lining.

In fact as I now know  nearly all tin cans and all aluminium cans are BPA lined and have been since the 50s. The liner can be white or yellow or transparent in which case it is  undetectable.

As a result – in most cases it is best to assume that your can has a plastic liner and  that it contains BPA.

However some companies are bucking the trend

Native Forest -coconut milk Organic mango chunks, papaya chunks and tropical fruit salad are now packed in non-BPA cans, as are most of our canned pineapple items. “ We are currently in the process of converting all Native Forest items to non-BPA cans, but we are not there yet.”

Ecofish brand tuna ect and Vital Choice are also BPA FREE….

http://www.ecofish.com

http://newsletter.vitalchoice.com/e_article001303243.cfm?x=b11,0,w

Oregon‘s Choice Gourmet 6 oz. lightly salted Albacore and come next canning season “we will be phasing in BPA free cans for more of our products. Our goal is to have everything canned in the BPA free cans within two years.

Wild Planet canned tuna at Whole Foods -  On the can it reads “Can Certified BPA Free.”

Eden:  Company says they DO use BPA in tomato cans. However, organic bean cans do NOT contain BPA.

Trader Joe’s:

Canned items in our stores WITH BPA lining in the cans would include: tomatoes, tomato sauce & paste, soups, chili, and stew.

Canned items in our stores that DO NOT have BPA lining in the cans include:

seafood (tuna, salmon, herring, sardines, etc.), chicken, turkey & beef and now beans and corn. All of our products and packaging are within food safety guidelines and regulations. However, we also wanted to inform you that we do not have any plastic packaging with BPA.

COCA COLA is not only defending BPA as safe but is spending millions of dollars lobbying and publicizing it’s safety to prevent regulations restricting it’s use. Please call and voice your opinion.1-800-get-coke ext 2

The above information has been adapted from a post on Organic Graces blog but can also be found on

Treehugger who have a good write up on (the same) companies who are using BPA free cans

Plastic Lined Tins

Organic Grace has gone one step further and quoted a customer who had spoken “directly to the companies listed below and they all said they use BPA as a chemical component in the lining of their food cans”.

Bush Brothers & Co (known for their Bush’s Beans brand)

Swanson division of Campbells

Campbell’s

Libby’s, Nestle, Carnation (different divisions of the same co)

Con Agra (Ex:Rosarita brand refried beans).

S&W Organic said they do have trace amounts of bp-A in their cans.

Annie’s

(the one with the bunny) is using BPA in the epoxy lining but says they are looking into alternatives.

This is a people driven list so feel free to add to it. I have added

Hienz - I spoke to them personally to confirm that they use BPA linings in their products.

More on BPA here and all over the internet.

Related Articles

• BPA Free Canning Lids Now Available From Tattler (treehugger.com)
• Bisphenol Found In Overwhelming Majority Of Canadians (lockergnome.com)
• Statscan survey finds BPA present in 91 per cent of Canadians (theglobeandmail.com)
• Waiter, There’s BPA in My Soup (via Food Freedom) (wilderside.wordpress.com)
• Heinz meanz plastic jars for Beanz (greenreview.blogspot.com)

Lots of lovely plastic…

Sperm whale with netting wound round its lower jaw

Originally uploaded by Bag the Bruck

floating round the sea … killing all the sea beasts and ending up in me.

Plastic Free Breasts

Whats in plastic might cost you your lady lumps. Not a nice subject I know but check out this breast cancer website – it might help you keep your bits.

BPA update

BPA or Bisphenol A has been in the news recently – lots of people are getting worried about the possible effects it has on your hormones. Pregnant women and babies are felt to be especially vulnerable.

Quick identification – plastics containing BPA are labeled with the number “7” identification code, BUT not all plastics labeled with the number “7” contain BPA. The number “7” code is assigned to the “Other” category, which includes all plastics not otherwise assigned to categories #1-6. See softlanding for more on this

BPA is also found in the plastic linings of most cans of food.

Boycott Plastic

Check out these plastic-free products sourced as part of our plastic boycott and listed in the Plastic-free Resource Index

Click here to know more about us, plastic the blog

I’m a Barbie Girl…

Lifes fantastic when your plastic…. better had be as we’ve all got the plastic in us

Life’s fantastic when your plastic…. better had be as we’ve all got the plastic in us

Lets start with the chemicals in plastic;

They are added to give plastic a wide range of properties. Some of those chemicals are extremely toxic- or are known to affect our hormones.

The chemicals in plastic appear to be mobile and can leach from the plastic product into your food.

Some of the chemicals used to make plastic have not actually been passed as fit for human consumption.

There are thousands of chemicals used to make plastic and we do not know what they all are.

Chemicals are be released when plastic is burnt. Some of them are lethal

But here are some that we do know about

Dioxins
Dioxins, which are highly toxic even at low doses, and are produced when plastics are manufactured and incinerated.

Bisphenol A or BPA

BPA can leach into food from the epoxy linings in cans or from polycarbonate bottles. Many studies have evaluated BPA as a hormone disruptor. Pregnant women and very young children are considered by some to be especially at risk.

Phthalates
To make Clingfilm clingy and flexible plastics bendy  manufacturers add various toxic chemicals known as “plasticizers” during production. Traces of these chemicals can leak out of PVC when it comes in contact with foods. Yikes. What’s more they are “reasonably anticipated” to be carcinogens and are not good for lab rats.

Antimony
#1 PETE plastic water bottles have been shown to leach antimony into water. Small dose of which make you sick large doses can kill you. Ughh.

Plastics in the food chain

If its not the leaching its the fish and chips. When it finally does finally break down plastic doesn’t actually biodegrade it photo degrades. It falls apart in to smaller and smaller toxic particles. These are then absorbed into the surrounding environment entering the water and earth and so the food chain and so into us.

Lots more information here

Lots more on the various types of plastic and what they are used to make can be found HERE

Find out about plastic, why we boycott it and who we are here