When Z and I needed a break from octopus-watching at the Seattle Aquarium (she had been fever-free all morning but had developed one again during the outing) we found refuge in the second-floor cafe, where a lemon sugar cookie and peppermint tea (her) and coffee (me) held much promise for raising our spirits. The vacant, long-suffering look of my sick kid, even clutching her prized whale cookie, caught my eye and I raised my camera for a photo.

Z's grandmother works as a commercial portrait photographer, so our daughter is used to posing.


I want a picture that shows how you feel, I said.


And then she coughed.


The kid is finally on the mend - today's her first day with no fever, and we've been back in Texas since Saturday. Z cried for twenty minutes this morning when she learned she wouldn't be headed to her grandmother's house due to her fever the previous night, skywriting broken hearts and crossed-out happy faces at the ceiling from bed. When that storm had passed, however, she saw a fine day of recovery while Daddy took the day off work.

We live in one of the many communities where all playgrounds seem to have the same equipment. But we're visiting family and making art in Seattle this week, where there are many playgrounds that are memorable for their unique play structures and toys. Z and I visited a park a couple days ago that had this amazing piece of equipment. In addition to the actions my second cousin is performing below, the backhoe also turns 360 degrees on its pole, allowing for some major construction projects.

The Food and Drug Administration recently announced a new assessment of the endocrine-disrupting chemical bisphenol-A, and it's a sharp turnaround from their previous claims. The agency has spent the last decade and a half propping up industry's insistence that there is nothing wrong with using BPA, and exposing our children to it, whenever and however they want. For those of us who have been arguing for the banning of BPA in children's products for years, it is a turning point.

The FDA's about-face

First, the big wins: In addition to confirming the National Toxicology Program's assessment of "some concern," the FDA is now advising consumers to avoid BPA when practical, and offering tips on how to do so.

For those of us who have been watching the FDA battle it out with activists for the past several years, hearing this practical and precautionary advice from the decade-long, head-in-the-sand defender of BPA is surreal, but not entirely unexpected. The Obama administration signaled that things would be different at the FDA, which has had haphazard or absent leadership for most of the past decade; its current head, commissioner Margaret Hamburg, is the first well-qualified commish since David Kessler's eight-year run in the 1990s.

The agency has also called for more research, and has the funding to make it happen. To wit:

At this interim stage, FDA shares the perspective of the National Toxicology Program that recent studies provide reason for some concern about the potential effects of BPA on the brain, behavior, and prostate gland of fetuses, infants and children. FDA also recognizes substantial uncertainties with respect to the overall interpretation of these studies and their potential implications for human health effects of BPA exposure. These uncertainties relate to issues such as the routes of exposure employed, the lack of consistency among some of the measured endpoints or results between studies, the relevance of some animal models to human health, differences in the metabolism (and detoxification) of and responses to BPA both at different ages and in different species, and limited or absent dose response information for some studies.

FDA is pursuing additional studies to address the uncertainties in the findings, seeking public input and input from other expert agencies, and supporting a shift to a more robust regulatory framework for oversight of BPA to be able to respond quickly, if necessary, to protect the public.

Those external agencies include the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Institutes of Health (which formed the National Toxicology Program that lent the first high-governmental imprimatur on what had previously been an effort by independent organizations, including ours), and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CPSC and EPA are likely to advocate aggressive regulation; what the CDC thinks about all this is anybody's guess, and depending on whether there is enough external pressure to make this discussion an open one, we may never find out.

The waiting game

But there is already a lot of research out there. Given the way the FDA has dragged its feet on this issue (repeatedly missing deadlines for this very reassessment, for starters) and the agency's past reliance on a reverse precautionary approach ("we don't know enough to regulate"), it's hard for advocates to see this as anything but stalling. The refusal to accept the overwhelming body of research indicating that BPA poses a threat to human - particularly fetal and children's - health gives their list of recommendations for avoiding BPA a whiff of the wolf in sheep's clothing. Is the FDA just stalling again? And if so, why?

It's all about the timing.

Industry-friendly regulation doesn't just mean failing to regulate when you can get away with it, and extends even beyond regulating as little or as poorly as possible when forced to do so. It also means making the process of promulgating regulations, however inevitable they might be, as "slow-tracked" as possible so that companies with poor investments (i.e. unsafe products) can comfortably shift operations and lose little or no money in the transition to a safer world. This is why traditional industry roadblocks - lobbying, PR, etc. - are never a wasted investment; the longer affected parties can draw out the process, the more the losers look like winners.

Note how the FDA structures its recommendations for avoiding BPA:

At this interim stage, FDA supports reasonable steps to reduce exposure of infants to BPA in the food supply. In addition, FDA will work with industry to support and evaluate manufacturing practices and alternative substances that could reduce exposure to other populations. ...

FDA is supporting the industry’s actions to stop producing BPA-containing bottles and infant feeding cups for the U.S. market. FDA understands that over the past year, the major manufacturers of these products have stopped selling new BPA-containing bottles and infant feeding cups for the U.S. market. Glass and polypropylene bottles and plastic disposable "bag" liners have long been alternatives to polycarbonate nursing bottles.

FDA is facilitating the development of alternatives to BPA for the linings of infant formula cans. FDA has already noted increased interest on the part of infant formula manufacturers to explore alternatives to BPA-containing can linings, and has received notifications for alternative packaging. The agency is supporting efforts to develop and use alternatives by (1) working with manufacturers regarding the regulatory status and safety of alternative liners; (2) giving technical assistance to those wishing to prepare applications for approval of alternatives; and (3) expeditiously reviewing any such new applications for alternatives. Because reliable can lining materials are a critical factor in ensuring the quality of heat processed liquid infant formula, safe replacement of such materials requires not only that they both be safe for food contact but also allow for processing that is fully functional in protecting the safety and quality of the infant formula itself.

The American Academy of Pediatrics and other health authorities recommend breastfeeding as the optimal nutrition for infants. Infant formula, including infant formula packaged in cans, is a safe and acceptable alternative that provides known nutritional benefits and prevents life-threatening nutritional deficiencies.

FDA is not recommending that families change the use of infant formula or foods, as the benefit of a stable source of good nutrition outweighs the potential risk of BPA exposure.

As for canned foods, the FDA says:

With respect to uses of BPA in packaging of food intended for other populations, FDA will support changes in food can linings and manufacturing to replace BPA or minimize BPA levels where the changes can be accomplished while still protecting food safety and quality. FDA will support efforts to develop alternatives for other can lining applications similar to those which are already being tested for liquid infant formula packaging. Reliable can lining materials are a critical factor in ensuring the quality of heat processed foods. Therefore, FDA will work to encourage and facilitate changes that minimize exposure to BPA and avoid other adverse impacts on food safety or quality.

How it went down, and how it will play out

The FDA staunchly refused to admit any hazard from infant and fetal exposure to BPA for years despite mounting evidence and independent assessments that it was a source of concern. In the past two years, the baby industrial complex has scrambled to remove BPA from baby bottles, to the extent that now only no-name imports, a few clueless design-oriented companies, and holdout Avent (with their Tempo disposable-liner system) produce bottles made with BPA-rich polycarbonate plastic. The canned products industry has only begun admitting, privately, that they are working on BPA-free cans, in the last year, but they don't have one yet. Now the FDA has come out to say that they believe parents should avoid polycarbonate plastic baby products but NOT canned or jarred food (baby food jars contain BPA in the coating on the lid). If it sounds to you like the FDA is simply working to protect those businesses that would lose business from BPA avoidance while advising consumers to avoid only those products for which all viable companies have alternatives on offer, you're hearing the same tune we are. And our discussions with industry representatives in the food packaging industry only confirm this timeline, making the FDA's current "stalling" very much par for the course.

Here's a prediction for you, extrapolated from carefully-worded conversations we have had on background with industry representatives who know what they're talking about.

Barring unforseen obstacles, the canning industry is roughly 12 months away from approval of food-grade coating for metal cans and jar lids that does not contain BPA. By "the industry" we mean multiple, competing brands will have coated cans and lids available for use by food companies within that period. Our guess is that we will see BPA-free cans for all types of foods, including high-acid foods, jarred infant foods, and beverage containers (soft drink cans) on store shelves by January 2012 at the latest. Look for the "BPA-free" labels to start popping up around that time.

That's right, the move that the North American Metal Packaging Alliance has described as technically impossible and planned to counter with a pregnant, BPA-friendly spokesmom, is one to two years away. You heard it here first.

In the meantime, our advice to consumers is to avoid canned tomatoes (Pomi tomatoes come in Tetra-Pak cardboard packaging that is BPA-free) and to buy canned beans from Eden Organic, which uses C-enamel coated cans that are free of BPA.

What we don't know is whether the new coatings the canning industry offers up will leach other endocrine-disrupting chemicals, or whether the canning companies will have the foresight to do biological testing to ensure they don't use the "next BPA" in their next-generation cans. If they haven't, you can rest assured that someone will as soon as the material is available.

Amy over at Crunchy Domestic Goddess has an interesting post recently about disposing of - and passing on - used children's toys, and it encouraged us to write about something that has been bothering us for a while here at ZRecs. From our point of view, the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act is one of the biggest reasons why the trashing of useful - and perfectly safe - children's toys is going to get worse, not better, in the years to come.

We review and process dozens of children's products every month - during the ramp-up to the holiday shopping season, sometimes hundreds. These products are evaluated and use-tested for inclusion in the ZRecs Guide, considered for inclusion in ZRecs gift guides and for stand-alone reviews, and written about and discussed in opportunities we are offered to discuss kids' products in other forums. (Most recently, we wrote about twenty or so kids' gift recommendations that went out to 800,000 families through another parenting site, and appeared in a safer holiday toys TV segment in Austin that aired in December.)

To make a long story short, 90% of the products we receive - almost all of which are solicited by us, not sent unsolicited - are removed from their packaging and very gently used. So it was with great distress that we discovered that one of the outcomes of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act is that thrift stores around the country are beginning to stop stocking and selling most used children's items, everything from cribs - which probably shouldn't be on the secondhand market at all these days thanks to regular recalls of monstrous scope - to all manner of children's toys, games, and in some cases even books.

We live in College Station, Texas. Our local Goodwill stores no longer accept any used children's products, as a matter of policy, because of the cryptic but very real responsibility for total product safety that CPSIA places on them. (Please don't tell me thrift stores are off the hook. We've heard it, and they aren't. And "we probably won't have the resources to prosecute at your level" is not an acceptable business model, even for a charitable organization.) We have seen other cities where Goodwills and other thrift stores have enacted similar policies, and some that haven't. Even Goodwill stores, we learned in a call we placed to their national headquarters, can choose how to respond to CPSIA with regard to stocking children's toys.

Just before Christmas this year, we made our regular donation of still-in-the-box toys to a holiday toy drive - items we had not requested and had no interest in opening, and duplicates - you'd be surprised how often companies accidentally send two of an item, through some administrative glitch or another. But then we tried to donate a large number of items we had opened, used several times in play, photography, and adult assessment, but were in 'like new" condition, and had a very difficult time doing so. Our local Goodwill refused the toys entirely and the battered women's shelter would only take stuff that was still in the box. For everything out of its original packaging, we had to work really hard to find places that would accept use toys - many ended up going to local children's centers and waiting rooms that wouldn't be selling or giving away the toys, and thus were not covered under CPSIA.

For our purposes, it worked out fine. Things were a bit more hectic than usual but we tapped into a few new charities and outlets for the copious volume of stuff we receive and review. But it made our skin crawl to imagine how few parents would go through these hoops in order to get rid of used toys their children had outgrown or didn't like, or even Christmas gifts that fell quickly out of favor and needed a new home.

After Christmas had come and gone, we did a clean sweep of Z's old toys, getting rid of things she had outgrown or didn't really use under the auspices of making room for the new. Z was a trooper and gave up much more than we had anticipated, allowing us to free up space in her bedroom and the study that doubles as a playroom and make it easier for us to keep things clean and orderly so she can access the stuff she does love. But now I have two bins of toys sitting in my living room while I try to figure out what to do with them. My plan at this point is to list them on our local free email lists, but really, I'm pressed for time as it is and I'd much rather give those two giant bins of toys away in one fell swoop and have it over and done with! Listing them and making individual arrangements for pickup and so on and so forth is just barely within my ability to manage.

I can't stand to throw fun, safe, and useful toys away. But for someone less dedicated, I can imagine that those two giant bins of toys would have long been placed in a couple of giant trash bags and taken to the curb. And part of me can't blame them. My house is cluttered enough as it is and I barely have the time to scout around for places brave enough to accept them - including the vegetable-dyed wooden toys and organic cotton teethers and the other admirably safety- and environmentally-conscious children's products that make up the bulk of what we review. And not only do we fill up our landfills with these perfectly useful children's products, but where are children in families that rely on the used market - now and in the future - supposed to get toys and books? Do we just let them do without?

Almost everyone who follows what's happening at the CPSC knows that CPSIA is badly in need of fixing. The Commission itself has, after much floundering and self-contradiction, sent a list of recommended action items to Congress to address major problems in CPSIA - lead used in inaccessible product components (youth ATVs, bicycle valve stems, etc.), printed materials (books - a huge CPSIA problem, more on that in another post), the imposition of mass-production requirements on small crafters - but any better guidance or clearer regulation on the used children's market is a telling omission. The agency has also issued a second stay of enforcement on most provisions of the new law, just as it did one year ago.

We waited with bated breath for the CPSC to make its wish list of amendments to the law. Now that they have, it is looking clearer that secondhand children's goods are going to be left out in the cold even if the CPSIA is fixed - and we are going to see more and more dumpsters and dumps filling up because parents can't give the stuff away easily anymore.

Whether this problem will fade as a generation of children's products are purged from circulation is an unknown at this point. The CPSC would like us to think so, because most new products must be marked "indelibly" with the means to track them back to their source, so recalled items can be removed from the marketplace as they turn up at resellers. But this requires the CPSC to deliver a means for thrift stores to access this new, rich source of information about batches and lots of each and every children's product in a cost-effective manner, and certain types of products really cannot be marked in this way, and will be "rebels" once they are separated from their packaging, their tags are removed, or ink washes off.

It also begs the question of whether we are willing, as a society, to eject such a massive volume of newly-classified waste into our environment in order to protect ourselves from the portion that is truly unsafe, and enjoy the accompanying surge in downstream effects (phthalates leach just as well in landfills as they do in playrooms, although their route into our bodies may be less direct). The trouble is, no one asked us if we were; but it's happening, and if it isn't happening in your own backyard now, it will be before you know it.

If you'd like to learn more about our concerns about the CPSIA, from the perspective of bloggers who are all about safety in children's products, you can read the post we wrote about the CPSIA nearly a year ago today.

Last week, the CPSC announced the recall of a children's book published by St. Martin's Press that included a piece of vinyl that contained dangerous levels of lead. While the recall was the first in what will likely be a long list of novelty children's books coming under CPSC scrutiny for their incorporation of sketchy plastics, what really caught our eye about it was a note in the recall notice that indicated that the CPSC had been alerted to the product's lead levels by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group (US PIRG). Digging deeper, we discovered that US PIRG had reported their findings in a report published on November 24, 2009 - a full month and a half before the recall was announced.

Meanwhile, Target is continuing to "investigate" the Green Baby onesie ZRecs, in collaboration with the Center for Environmental Health, identified in November as containing nearly four times the legal limit of lead in its tagless label - putting it in direct contact with a baby's skin. The California Attorney General notified Target of the finding and Target stopped selling it while promising to investigate the matter themselves. (The Washington Post, in an otherwise excellent article on "citizen regulators," erroneously stated that Target had recalled the onesie. The Post ran a correction this week.) Target representative Beth Hanson confirmed in an email to us a week ago:

• Upon receiving the information from the California Attorney General's office about this product, Target issued a voluntary market withdrawal. This product has been removed from sale in our stores and we continue to investigate the issue.


• Once a market withdrawal has been issued, we hard lock all items at the point of sale. A “hard lock” means that should a guest attempt to purchase a withdrawn product while we are in the process of removing it from the sales floor, the product will flag our cashiers with a “do not sell” message at the register.


• It is important for all of our guests to know that Target is committed to providing high quality and safe products. We realize that product safety is top of mind for our guests. We continue to partner with our vendors to ensure that the best products are in our stores and online at Target.com.


• Since this is an ongoing investigation about this particular product, we are unable to provide further specifics.


• Guests who have purchased the withdrawn product can return it to any Target store for a full refund.

We inquired further regarding the timeline such an investigation might take, and Hanson declined to provide any estimate or any additional information about Target's review process. But it's hard, on its face, to accept that it should take this long for an issue like this to be resolved. The longer a company like Target waits, the greater the distance between purchase and notification, the greater the exposure children face, and the fewer returns the company is likely to get when the product is ultimately (presumably) recalled. The disincentives to conduct a timely recall are real and obvious.

The CPSC is also looking into this case and we are confident it will be resolved eventually. But how long can a company like Target make consumers wait before they cast even greater doubt on the commitment to safety the company claims to set as such a high priority?

More on onesie hazards to come.

Recalled for literally bursting out of their packaging a year ago this month, JAKKS Pacific's Spa Fantasy Aromatherapy Fountain and Bath Benefits kits from the company's Spa Factory line were "fixed" by including a second lid and instructions for the consumer to swap it out at home so the carbon dioxide that built up inside some containers could escape. This allowed JAKKS to continue selling the defective version of the product even after switching the caps on their production line for new batches. What consumers may not realize is how long it takes for these fix-it-yourself products to get through the supply chain, and they're still being sold a full year later. Depending on how JAKKS runs its supply chain, we could hit 2011 before they've all been sold.

At least thirteen consumers had been injured in 88 reports of exploding lids prior to the January 2009 recall; beyond the risk of injury from packaging shrapnel, the contents of the explody container include citric acid. Injuries so far have mostly been limited to eye irritation and cuts or bruises to the face.

But new incidents are raising the question of whether the CPSC went far enough in its negotiations with JAKKS to remedy the issue. Is it reasonable and fair to consumers to permit a company sell them a product which, if left untouched, may explode? I'm not sure I've heard of another product like that.

KHOU has just reported on one Houston area family's unpleasant experience (video below), and notes that JAKKS Pacific's hotline went unanswered despite numerous attempts to contact them about the issue.



You don't have to go far to find similar occurrences post-"fix". The sole customer review on Amazon for the Spa Fantasy Aromatherapy Fountain offers a second consumer's report of an exploding container, which was posted less than a month ago. "My niece loved this toy, so much that she actually wrote me a thank you note. Apparently the best part of the whole thing is that the kit exploded everywhere, which she said was "way cool" (but I'm not sure her mother appreciated). Because of this, I'm not sure I'd buy this brand again."