Study shows BPA in canned soft drinks

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March 6, 2009

The study conducted by Health Canada showing the toxic chemical bisphenol-A (BPA) leaching from soft drink cans demonstrates that Canadians are being exposed to BPA in a wide variety of product — often without their knowledge.

The study, which originally appeared in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry in January before being posted on Health Canada’s website this month, revealed that canned soft drinks and energy drinks contained BPA at levels ranging from 0.3 to 4.5 micrograms per litre, or parts per billion. The highest levels were found in energy drinks, which are popular among teenagers and university students for their caffeine jolt.

"Those levels may not seem high by themselves, but when you include them in the total intake of BPA from a number of source, they contribute to higher aggregate levels that are showing up in the population," said Toxic Free Canada research coordinator Sean Griffin. "We're exposed to BPA from dozens of different products every day —linings in food cans, food packaging, even the thermal paper receipts used for credit card slips. The latest health research on BPA shows that we really don't know what a safe level might be — or even if there is a safe level," Griffin said.

Teenagers drinking pop or energy drinks would also be a vulnerable population since their bodies are still developing and the BPA concentrations would also be higher after they’d consumed an energvy drink because of their smaller body size.

Evidence from animal studies over the last decade has been mounting and now links BPA to breast and prostate cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, insulin resistance and obesity. Studies have also shown that it may affect neurological and brain development in the fetus.

An epidemiological study published last year produced the first direct evidence that the BPA levels currently found in humans are associated with disease. It found that those with the highest BPA levels in their blood had two to three times the risk of cardiovascular disease.

Dr. Frederick vom Saal, a leading export on BPA at the University of Missouri said that many of the potential health effects of BPA, including cancer, have occurred far below so-called safety limits — even as much as 1,000 times below.

A paper prepared last year for an international conference on BPA also warned that the current levels of BPA found in humans can't be explained by the known sources of BPA. Either we are being exposed to BPA from unexpected sources, the paper said, or BPA is lingering in our bodies longer than previously thought.

Because of that, Griffin said, Health Canada should be striving to reduce consumer exposures to BPA wherever possible. In a submission to the federal government Chemical Management Plan, Toxic Free Canada urged the federal agency to work with industry to phase out BPA from can linings, including soft drink cans.

"Consumers should also have the right to know if the product they're buying is going to expose them to BPA or another toxic chemical — and that means hazard labelling on the container," he said.