Wakefield, 15 January 2010 -- Despite growing evidence to the contrary, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has long held that bisphenol A (BPA) - used to make the hard, clear plastic polycarbonate - is safe even when indirectly ingested via plastic baby bottles or canned food linings. This has now changed as the government begins to raise flags about BPA. The FDA just released it's Update on Bisphenol for Use in Food Contact Applications: January 2010, and states that it has "some concern about the potential effects of BPA on the brain, behavior, and prostate gland in fetuses, infants, and young children. In cooperation with the National Toxicology Program, FDA’s National Center for Toxicological Research is carrying out in-depth studies to answer key questions and clarify uncertainties about the risks of BPA." 

This moves the U.S. more in the direction of Canada, where the Canadian Government has designated BPA as toxic and banned its use in baby bottles.  The FDA will now carry out in-depth studies to answer key questions and clarify uncertainties about the risks of BPA. In the interim, the FDA has posted BPA information for parents, including recommendations on how to reduce exposure to BPA. 

Image credit:  Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)

Ottawa, 10 December 2009 -- As the first week of the United Nations Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen comes to a close, we wanted to highlight the important creative work of Moms Against Climate Change, a partnership between the NGO's Environmental Defence and ForestEthics to give Canadian parents a forum for joining together and demanding global warming action from Canada's political leaders. Take a look at the video that began the initiative and has since gone viral and been named YouTube's most watched activist video worldwide.

One of the goals of the campaign has been to compile a web wall of uploaded photos of children - a reminder to political leaders of who they really serve.  AND TODAY... thousands of photographs of children from every province and territory are being projected on high-visibility buildings around Ottawa and Vancouver, Canada as part of a 'global warming photo wall' to remind Prime Minister Stephen Harper who he is supposed to be representing in Copenhagen as the Canadian Parliament recesses for the year. This statement on the Mom's website sums it up: "NEVER UNDERESTIMATE WHAT A MOTHER CAN ACCOMPLISH."

Wakefield, 27 November 2009 -- Phthalates - the ubiquitous plasticizing chemicals found in bottles, dishes, toys, cleaning and personal care products - are a smoking gun, maybe the next tobacco. They need to be dealt with yesterday because it is children who are most vulnerable to them, and the effects of exposure to phthalates may not surface for years. By then, damage is done. Korean researchers have found a significant positive association between urine phthalate concentrations and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in a study of 261 Korean children aged between 8 and 11 years old. Here is the abstract of the scientific article in the peer-reviewed journal Biological Psychiatry.

And if you are looking for an overview of the toxic chemicals that surround us in everyday life, then check out the highly readable, utterly shockingly eye-opening Slow Death by Rubber Duck.

 (Photo credit: breastpumpsdirect.com)

San Francisco, 11 November 2009 -- Remembrance Day best wishes to Canadians out there. Life Without Plastic is in San Francisco for the 2009 Green Business Conference (you can read more about that on our blog) and attending, but not exhibiting at, the San Francisco Green Festival.  So while on the West Coast, it's an honour to highlight the stunning work of Seattle-based award-winning photographer, Chris Jordan. He has released a mesmerizing, must-watch video of photos he took in September 2009.  Here is his own description of this powerful, powerful, powerful photo and video essay, which you can watch on YouTube or directly on his site, where full size images like the one below are also available for viewing:

"These photographs of albatross chicks were made just a few weeks ago on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world's most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent."

 

Photo Credit:  Chris Jordan

www.chrisjordan.com