Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh, and
Speaker 1: there's Chuck and Jerry sitting in for a day. So
Speaker 1: this is short stuff about the beware of the pas.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: We're talking about BPAs specifically, well BPA, which is how
Speaker 3: do you pronounce that.
Speaker 1: Josh, I'm going with this phenol or bisphenol.
Speaker 2: Hey, bisphenol A.
Speaker 3: There are other bisphenols apparently which I didn't know, and
Speaker 3: apparently you know.
Speaker 2: None of these are good.
Speaker 3: For you, even though the FDA is like, it's fine
Speaker 3: in the amounts that you're getting it.
Speaker 1: Stop being so uptight, everybody. Yeah, they're used in all
Speaker 1: sorts of plastics, polycarbonate in particular. But that stuff shows
Speaker 1: up everywhere. It can be in the stuff that lines
Speaker 1: tin cans, it can be in your dental work, it
Speaker 1: can be in contact lens, storage containers, baby bottles used
Speaker 1: to be. I don't think it is anymore, but it
Speaker 1: was everywhere. It's also now still today. The greatest exposure
Speaker 1: that people get on average is from holding receipts thermal
Speaker 1: paper receipts.
Speaker 2: Oh interesting, those.
Speaker 1: Are coded with BPA, so just be aware of that.
Speaker 1: I saw a study that said just holding one for
Speaker 1: ten seconds exposed you to unsafe levels of BPA.
Speaker 3: You know, many years ago when we lived in Los Angeles,
Speaker 3: And it's the jokes Emily still laughs at to this
Speaker 3: day because it's just very me very sardonically. Chuck was
Speaker 3: we left a Blockbuster video and it was like Princh, Princh,
Speaker 3: and they did that thing where there was a ticker
Speaker 3: tape of like three feet of receipts each you know,
Speaker 3: connected by a little tiny piece of paper, and he
Speaker 3: handed them to me and I just went, thank you
Speaker 3: for the receipts. And Emily thought that was the funniest
Speaker 3: thing ever, and she still says.
Speaker 2: It to this day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I could see being in the right place, in
Speaker 1: the right frame of mind and just finding that awesome.
Speaker 3: Yeah, really stoned at Blockbuster.
Speaker 1: Sure do you remember when you rented?
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, who knows.
Speaker 3: But now that I don't feel so bad now that
Speaker 3: I know that those things are loaded with BPAs.
Speaker 2: I don't want those in my pocket.
Speaker 1: No, you don't. And the reason why we're even like
Speaker 1: talking about BPA is all thanks to a geneticist named
Speaker 1: doctor Patricia Hunt, who was studying the ovaries of mice
Speaker 1: back in the late nineties, nineteen ninety eight. That was
Speaker 1: her jam. She was not looking for BPA, she was
Speaker 1: not studying BPA at all, but BPA came and found her.
Speaker 3: Essentially, Yeah, she saw these chromosotal errors start popping up.
Speaker 3: They went from two percent to forty percent in these
Speaker 3: mice that she was studying in the control group, and
Speaker 3: that you know, there was miscarriage, there were birth effects
Speaker 3: in these little baby mice. It's all very sad. And
Speaker 3: she ran some more tests and she was like, you
Speaker 3: know what, all of these cages and water bottles that
Speaker 3: these mice are drinking out of have BPA in them,
Speaker 3: and I think that's where it's coming from. So she
Speaker 3: swapped that stuff out with non BPA stuff. Everything returned
Speaker 3: to normal, and she was like, I think I found
Speaker 3: something really bad here.
Speaker 2: Everybody, Yeah, she did.
Speaker 1: She also really started to examine what BPA did. Disrupted
Speaker 1: fetal development. The eggs of the fetus that had its
Speaker 1: development disrupted, that fetus's eventual babies those were also disrupted
Speaker 1: as well. So yeah, she was like, I think something
Speaker 1: is really bad here. And what she turned up is
Speaker 1: that BPA acts as an endocrine disruptor, meaning it mimics
Speaker 1: a hormone in our body, which does all sorts of
Speaker 1: stuff because our hormones are very very well precisely timed,
Speaker 1: and you go over here and do this, you go
Speaker 1: over here and do that. And if something shows up
Speaker 1: on mass and is like we're gonna do all of
Speaker 1: this at once, there's all sorts of catastrophic things that
Speaker 1: can happen to the human body.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3: And in this case, in the case of BPA, what
Speaker 3: it really does is affect estrogen, and estrogen has a
Speaker 3: huge effect on a lot of stuff. I think it
Speaker 3: can affect the behavior of more than two hundred genes
Speaker 3: and almost every organ and tissue in the body can
Speaker 3: be affected by estrogen. So this was a big deal
Speaker 3: at the time. There were a lot of initial reactions
Speaker 3: of like, you know, we're not sure how bad this stuff.
Speaker 2: Is for you.
Speaker 3: We're not going to do anything right now, Like the
Speaker 3: evidence is like not really conclusive because we're not mice
Speaker 3: and so we're not necessarily going to experience the same
Speaker 3: health effects. And again these limits are like the amount
Speaker 3: that we're getting shouldn't harm it, Like, you know, children
Speaker 3: and adults.
Speaker 1: Right, that was wrong. It turns out that the limits
Speaker 1: that we were being exposed to were considered harm or
Speaker 1: are considered very harmful. Now, but what's something weird, Just
Speaker 1: a little thing to kind of put aside. It actually
Speaker 1: turns out that low doses of BPA have worse effects
Speaker 1: than larger doses of BPA.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's weird.
Speaker 1: I didn't see anywhere that that was explained, so I
Speaker 1: came up with my own explanation. It's three stooges syndrome,
Speaker 1: which is how remember mister Burns had every disease, but
Speaker 1: none of them were affecting them because they were all
Speaker 1: trying to get through the same door at once. I
Speaker 1: think that's what happens when you have a bunch of BPA.
Speaker 1: They all get stuck trying to get through the same
Speaker 1: door at the same time, and it doesn't affect you
Speaker 1: like a little bit does, which can make it right
Speaker 1: through the door.
Speaker 3: All right, doctor Clark, We're going to take a break
Speaker 3: and ponder that, and we'll be right back with more
Speaker 3: on BPAs.
Speaker 2: I gotta say I'm very impressed.
Speaker 1: Thank you, But I feel like I should say I
Speaker 1: am not a doctor, and you really shouldn't listen to
Speaker 1: me with any medical stuff. Whatsoever.
Speaker 2: But I called you a doctor.
Speaker 1: Oh well, then I'm a doctor.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 3: So, in the United States, the FDAs, who was in
Speaker 3: charge of regulating the BPA use, and in twenty ten
Speaker 3: they did a four year review of BPA studies which
Speaker 3: resulted in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 2: Basically saying, you know what.
Speaker 3: We're upholding our previous no observed adverse effects level label.
Speaker 3: As long as you don't get more than five milligrams
Speaker 3: of body weight per kilogram of body weight per day,
Speaker 3: you'll be fine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think that that is a level that
Speaker 1: most people are never exposed to, right.
Speaker 2: Well, that's what they say.
Speaker 3: I mean, we should talk about some of the things though,
Speaker 3: I know you mentioned a few things.
Speaker 2: But let me see here.
Speaker 3: Type two diabetes potentially in adults, insulin resistance in children
Speaker 3: and adults, polycystic ovary syndrome, obesity and high pretension in
Speaker 3: children and adults.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of terrible stuff. And again this is
Speaker 1: not to mention like the pre term births, developmental abnormalities,
Speaker 1: like all sorts of different stuff that has to do
Speaker 1: with reproduction, breast cancer, tumors, like all of these things.
Speaker 1: Like it used to be, like, like you said, we're
Speaker 1: not mice. And you know that whole settled science bs that,
Speaker 1: like the merchants of doubt used to put out like
Speaker 1: just shamelessly, like if you look at meta analyzes of
Speaker 1: studies about BPA and its effect on the human body,
Speaker 1: like you said, that's what comes up. It's obviously you
Speaker 1: can never prove anything like without a shadow of a doubt.
Speaker 1: That's just how science works. But it's essentially to the
Speaker 1: point where you, the individual person can feel pretty good
Speaker 1: about not wanting BPA anywhere near you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. For sure.
Speaker 3: Europe, of course is leading the way in front of us.
Speaker 3: In April, just a few years ago, in twenty twenty three,
Speaker 3: they're at DA which is the European Food Safety Authority,
Speaker 3: said all right, we've seen the research and I think
Speaker 3: they they lowered their safe level a lot. I think
Speaker 3: to point two what is that to point two nanograms,
Speaker 3: which is two billions of a gram or point two
Speaker 3: billions of a gram per day for like, you know,
Speaker 3: a human body. So that's that's way lower than ours, is.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, and it's even lower than what their previous
Speaker 1: one was. Their previous one was still way lower than ours.
Speaker 1: So ours was five milligrams per kilogram. I think it's
Speaker 1: the same still, their old one was four micrograms per
Speaker 1: kilogram of body weight, so now it's their Their new
Speaker 1: revised safe level is twenty thousand times lower than their
Speaker 1: own previous safe level, ten billion trillion ish times lower
Speaker 1: than are our safe level in the United States. And
Speaker 1: when they when the European Food Safety Authority basically decided this,
Speaker 1: there were all sorts of like, like, you know, is
Speaker 1: this true? Is this right? You know? And of course
Speaker 1: industry was pushing back on it. The only paper I
Speaker 1: found that was critical of it an academic journal paper
Speaker 1: that was critical of their their methods of data collection.
Speaker 1: I was like, funded this. It was funded by the
Speaker 1: American Chemistry Council. So they're like, it seems pretty like
Speaker 1: the EFSA has over the years or since April twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three, continued to issue defenses of its decision and
Speaker 1: not like we decided, so shut up. They're like, we decided,
Speaker 1: and here's why we decided. Here's all the data we
Speaker 1: did this on. So it seems pretty legitimate that they're like,
Speaker 1: this is way worse than we have been taking it,
Speaker 1: and especially in the United States.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well if you go to the FDA website today
Speaker 3: date April thirtieth, twenty twenty six. It says FDA's current perspective,
Speaker 3: based on its most recent safety assessment, is that BPA
Speaker 3: is safe at the current levels occurring in foods. Based
Speaker 3: on FDA's ongoing safety review of scientific evidence, the available
Speaker 3: information continues to support the safety of BPA for the
Speaker 3: currently approved uses in food containers and packaging. But if
Speaker 3: you don't buy that, and I don't, I don't think
Speaker 3: doctor Josh, does you need to look for a label
Speaker 3: that says BPA free that will indicate that the plastic
Speaker 3: does not have buy cheese.
Speaker 2: Bis spinal Is that what you said? He did bis
Speaker 2: spent all A.
Speaker 3: But like I said, it could have bispon al F
Speaker 3: or bispon all S or something else, and that may
Speaker 3: be just as risky.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Here's how you remember that. It's like a bisk made
Speaker 1: of polyphen hal Yeah.
Speaker 2: Oh, I love bisc That's a shame.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So if you're like, Okay, BPA free, great, give
Speaker 1: it to me. It turns out, like you said, there's
Speaker 1: other bisphenols. Bisphenol F and S are now used as substitutes.
Speaker 1: They're not nearly as studied as BPA has been. But
Speaker 1: essentially the studies that are coming back are like, yeap
Speaker 1: just as bad as BPA does all the same things.
Speaker 1: So essentially the focus on BPA itself should have been
Speaker 1: expanded from the outset to bisphenols, not just BPA. And
Speaker 1: so yeah, now there's BPF and bps all over the place.
Speaker 1: And if you think that you what you have is
Speaker 1: BPA free, is probably still has bisphenols in it.
Speaker 2: Why don't they just find something else?
Speaker 1: Well, they did, it's called glass. But the problem is
Speaker 1: glass stainless steel containers. They often come with plastic tops
Speaker 1: and lids, and you have to be careful with that too,
Speaker 1: because even if the lids metal, it may still have
Speaker 1: a plastic liner on the top of it, and that
Speaker 1: probably has at least some sort of plastic associated with
Speaker 1: it that could be getting in whatever you're drinking out of.
Speaker 2: But do you have to have abys final to have
Speaker 2: plastic at all?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guarantee if you really looked into it,
Speaker 1: it's like half a cent less, right, something safe?
Speaker 2: And that's your answer, you know, Yeah.
Speaker 1: One day we're going to get there, Chuck, I hope
Speaker 1: we're still alive to see it. But one day we're
Speaker 1: going to get there where people actually take care of
Speaker 1: other people and we all care about one another, we
Speaker 1: all act like it.
Speaker 2: We're going to get there, that's right.
Speaker 3: And in the meantime, you and I and every other
Speaker 3: member of the Stuff you should normally is going to
Speaker 3: try and be squeezing through that same door together.
Speaker 1: Also in the meantime, Short Stuff is out. Stuff You
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