2023-09-15 18:59:22
“We welcome with satisfaction the European Commission’s direction of wanting to ban bisphenol A from food containers. In this way Europe demonstrates that it is moving in the direction of greater protection of human health and true primary prevention which aims to remove the exposures to chemical contaminants and endocrine disruptors from our daily lives”. The president of the Italian Society of Environmental Medicine (Sima) Alessandro Miani wrote this in a note, commenting on the European regulation to ban the use of bisphenol A in materials in contact with food.
“It should not be forgotten – he underlines – that bisphenol A is a molecule similar to estrogen, artificially synthesized and initially designed for medical uses, but which then found use in a risky way as a component of plastic products, even in baby bottles , becoming ubiquitously present in the environment and thus configuring a striking example of failure to apply the precautionary principle enshrined in Article 191 of the Treaties on the Functioning of the European Union”. The epidemiologist Prisco Piscitelli, vice-president of Sima, recalls that “from 2006 to today, approximately 300 studies have been published on the effects of bisphenol A and its mechanisms of interference with the metabolic system of men and women. Scientific evidence indicates that the bisphenol A is also present as a contaminant in fetuses in the prenatal period. The data on the health damage caused by this substance accumulates year after year: from a study by Columbia University in New York on over 1,200 children we know that the presence of bisphenol A in urine is associated with the development of childhood obesity starting from 7 years of age, but also with insulin resistance and diabetes with high concentrations of glycated hemoglobin”.
Some “studies – continues Piscitelli – also suggest a possible negative effect on the cardiovascular system, with increased risk of metabolic syndrome, increase in visceral fat, atherosclerosis, hypertension, myocardial hypertrophy and heart attack. Other areas being studied by researchers regarding exposure to bisphenol A concern gestational diabetes, polycystic ovary syndrome, male infertility and even breast cancer.More generally, it is a substance for which not all the mechanisms are yet known of action triggered by oxidative stress or even epigenetic damage and this is why it is absolutely necessary to adopt a prudential attitude to better protect public health. The European Commission’s orientation therefore represents a very timely response, even if late”.
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