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Wednesday, March 30, 2011
News / Biz It's the packaging, stupid
Posted By Rhiannon Fionn-Bowman on Wed, Mar 30, 2011 at 12:40 PM
As you pull today's meals out of plastic bags and unwind the shrinkwrap around them, then nuke them in plastic containers, consider this: There are chemicals in those plastics that are bad for your health.
Here's more from Discovery News:
Plastic wrappers, food cans and storage tubs deposit at least two potentially harmful chemicals into our food, confirmed a new study. By cutting out containers, people can dramatically reduce their exposures to these toxins.The chemicals -- bisphenol A, or BPA, and a phthalate called DEHP -- are known to disrupt hormonal systems in the bodies of both animals and people, leading to developmental and reproductive problems, as well as cancers, heart disease and brain disorders. And both appear in a wide variety of food packaging materials.
But when people in the new study avoided plastic and ate mostly fresh foods for just three days, the levels of these chemicals in their bodies dropped by more than 50 percent, and sometimes much more.
"What this says is that food packaging is really the major source of exposure to BPA and DEHP," said Ruthann Rudel, a toxicologist at the Silent Spring Institute, a research and advocacy group in Newton, Mass. "The good news is that we provide some evidence that people can make everyday decisions about their kitchens and their diets if they want to reduce exposure to these compounds."
Read the rest of this article, by Emily Sohn, here.
It's a real challenge to eat packaging-free, especially if you're used to storing and warming your food in plastic containers and you're not into cooking for yourself. But, getting started on a chemical-light diet is easy: visit your area farmer's market. Next step: get some unbleached wax paper and glass containers to store and heat your food in. Start taking your own bags to the grocery store (you know, the ones in your closet ... put them in your trunk), and reuse those same bags to carry your lunch to work. And, of course, as this month's Breathe Magazine points out, you and yours can always grow your own packaging-free food.
All big changes begin with baby steps, and all great things — like your health and your family's health — are worth working for.
Here's more about the politics behind BPA from PBS' Bill Moyers. Note: This video was posted in 2008.
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