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The shell game over BPA

By Jeremiah | September 15, 2008 | 1 comment / Join the conversation!

Let me get this straight:

Research scientists follow basic policies and procedures to ensure their research is reputable. Their findings are reviewed by peers who aggressively seek out flaws of methodology to vet their findings for anything that might compromise their validity. Findings must be reproducible.

Industry research studies are almost always intrinsically biased, spurred as they are by the desire to prove efficacy or safety in order to market products. To make industry-sponsored research as useful and reputable as humanly possible, excruciating oversight is applied to their practices. Voluminous documentation must be generated and provided with findings. The FDA calls these "Good Laboratory Practices," but they are only applied to industry studies - not, for example, to studies funded by the National Institutes of Health. The strict procedures that must be followed to be in compliance would be overkill for standard labs, not to mention so costly and time-consuming they wouldn't get much research done. Thankfully, industry is in the best position to afford the level of oversight their own motivations require. (And make no mistake, much laughable industry research is generated, and aggressively marketed, despite these requirements.)

Hundreds of studies in highly-respected, peer-review scientific journals have shown BPA to be harmful to a level that alarms many public health researchers and scientists. Effects found in individual studies have been replicated in dozens of others. A panel convened by the NIH, made up of top scientistis in the field, concluded that there is "some concern" about the effect of BPA on fetuses and infants, based on voluminous research, and called for much more.

The FDA's repeated claim that BPA is safe for consumption by pregnant women and infants is based on a handful of industry studies. The hundreds of studies suggesting BPA is dangerous were not considered in their decision because they do not use Good Laboratory Practices - those standards applied strictly to industry research.

The FDA has managed to raise the charge of being beholden to industry to a new level. Now it's a sign of their commitment to science that they disregard 98% of the relevant scientific community.

Scientists plan to take them on at an open meeting tomorrow.

Categories: BPA