Oh, my cash, there's poison in my receipt!
Of course, you’ve heard (and lamented) about Bisphenol A in baby bottles. FYI, BPA is an industrial chemical which poses significant health hazards to babies and pregnant women. It is used in the manufacture of polycarbonate plastics (that’s why plastic ain’t no fantastic) and epoxy resins, made into baby bottles, sippy cups, food and beverage containers, plastic dinnerware, dental sealants, and the lining of canned foods. It has been banned by various governments, especially in the baby bottles (now you know why, among other reasons, breast milk is best).
Now, hear this: BPA has also been found it in thermal paper receipts. Take note!
Uncommon culprit
“This shows how a dangerous chemical can be utilized in ways that a common person would not suspect,” Richard Gutierrez of Ban Toxics! sends us this explosive missive. “This is not just a case of enforcement; what is really needed is a move towards toxics-free materials. Why chase after toxins, when manufacturers can be mandated to remove these poisons from their products to begin with?”
BPA first hogged news headlines and seeped into people’s consciousness in 2007. In 2008, researchers found a link between BPA and cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and liver-enzyme abnormalities. They pointed out that adults with the highest BPA were more than twice as likely to have heart disease or diabetes than those with the lowest levels.
Battle vs the bottle
California state legislators have voted to ban BPA in baby products for children aged three years old and below. Last year, Denmark banned BPA in food and drink containers for kids below three. In 2008, Canada made history by becoming the first country to ban BPA in baby feeding bottles.
Here at home, health and chemical safety groups are waging a collective battle against the plastic bottle, among other BPA-tainted children’s products.
Next month, Canada is the venue of an international conference to be convened by the Food and Agriculture Organization and World Health Organization to develop guidelines for food safety.
Now, here’s more about this absorbing issue in an article titled “Cash receipts pose risk for BPA exposure” written by Brett Ruskin for Postmedia News. (The article came out in the September issue of Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, a German scientific journal.)
Datelined Ottawa, Canada, the article tells consumers that next time they buy a plastic water bottle, it may not contain bisphenol A all right, but the receipt might. Don’t look now, but recent studies found high levels of the toxin BPA in a most unlikely but very common place: cash register receipts.
Touching tale
One study warns “that touching a receipt for five seconds with a single fingertip wiped off up to 23 micrograms of bisphenol A (BPA). The chemical could then find its way onto food and be ingested. The amount wiped off increases tenfold when all fingers contact the paper and ‘by an order of magnitude,’ scientists say, when the paper is crumpled in one’s palm.”
According to Health Canada, it is dangerous to consume more than 25 micrograms per kilogram of body mass per day (BPA levels are measured in intangibly small micrograms and parts per billion.) But even levels lower than that may be too much. Research found “long-term adverse reproductive and carcinogenic effects” in mice fed only one microgram per kilogram of body mass.
According to Ruskin’s article, while there is much discussion on the effect of BPA on humans, “there’s been no conclusive testing to support or rebut detrimental claims.”
Do or dye
But for sure, a lot of BPA has been found in cash receipts. Did you know that receipts and theater and concert tickets are all printed on thermal paper? Writes Ruskin, “The dye is already part of the paper, which makes for an inexpensive and reliable printing process. When heat is applied, a solvent in the paper melts and allows dye to mix with BPA and darken, which produces the desired text.”
The chemicals in thermal paper have been analyzed by Boston scientists. Extracting the BPA from receipts from 10 businesses, researchers from the Warner Babcock Institute found between 3,000 and 19,000 micrograms in the 30-centimeter strips.
The article notes, “That much BPA is more than 12 times Health Canada’s limit for a 60-kilogram person, although it’s unlikely that the entire amount would wipe off in normal use.”
A handy tip: Wash your hands
Here’s a mouthful: A main concern is ingestion, says Janelle Witzel of Environmental Defense, a group lobbying against harmful chemicals.
Thus, next time you handle a receipt, say during a trip to the supermarket, make sure you wash your hands before you eat.
Other handy tips: Keep receipts away from children and toddlers. And separate them from unpackaged foods in grocery bags.
Scratch and tell
But it seems there’s no running away from BPA-laced receipts. Anywhere you go or pay, your receipt is probably printed on thermal paper. How can you be sure it’s thermal paper? Scratch it; if it leaves a mark, then it’s thermal paper.
It’s more expensive to produce BPA-free thermal paper, but there’s been a clamor among consumers for BPA-free thermal paper.
Say no to BPA? Yes!
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Not eggxactly!
Dear Consumerline,
Eggxactly! But not all that well put. While the Slate article (on expiry dates) points out that “expiration dates are supposed to inspire confidence but instead they leave us more confused than ever,” it utterly missed the bright side of the issue that matters most to budget-wise shoppers. Most grocery owners usually offer a hefty discount, 50 to 70 percent, on goods with expiring dates (just a few months hence), which naturally whets up the buying appetite of consumers.
— R. MACLANG Marikina City
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