Today is Works for Me Wednesdays, graciously hosted by Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer. It's another backwards edition -which means instead of bossing you around, I ask for help!

Here's my dilemma.

Since it came out that water bottles are leaching BPA, a chemical known to cause hormone disruption in humans, and the recall of polycarbonate and Nalgene water bottles (read about that here. And here.), I've been checking our plastics.

Most plastic items have a number inside a triangle on the bottom, which tells you what kind of plastic it is (and how to recycle it.) The consensus seems to be that numbers 2, 4, and 5 are safe for food use with humans.

Our plastic baby bottles are #7 - they've got to go! But what do I replace them with?

Thankfully, this is not a pressing issue for us right now. Baby X is still a champion nurser and I don't remember the last time he had a bottle. However, not everyone can nurse their babies.

Sometimes bottles are required (and thank goodness we have the technology to nurture infants without wet nurses, which was the only option for a long time!)

Any ideas?
::: Sideline editiorial :::
In Europe, #7 plastic has been banned in products for children. Meanwhile, our illustrious FDA says there's not enough evidence to consider such an action here. It was no secret that the plastics lobby campaigned hard on this issue! Almost every recall story I read makes me trust the FDA less and less. I think it's time our government created an independently funded organization that was prohibited from getting money from anywhere else to be in charge of food and drug safety. Maybe they can do independent studies of medication safety as well, instead of relying on Big Pharma to tell them if something is safe or not.
Yes! Mama actually endorses the creation of more government! Maybe we can get rid of most of the federal Department of Education in order to pay for it.

The National Institute of Health thinks this is a concern, even though the FDA does not. This is a 400 page paper on their review of current data from around the world. Table 10 on p. 37 records a British finding that infants bottles caused a BPA intake of 7-8 μg/kg of bodyweight per day; however, toxic levels in humans have not been adequately studied (I hear the Canadians are on it, though).

Labels: children, health, Recalls, Works For Me Wednesday