Canned goods safe?

Samuel Godefroy, Health Canada’s director of chemical safety in foods, says that levels of bisphenol A in canned foods are safe. However, he also told CTV: “We are encouraging manufacturers in general to lower the levels of any chemical, including BPA, in the food products that are available on the market,” he said. Good news!

He was responding to yesterday’s Globe and Mail/CTV report, finding that BPA levels in many canned goods exceed the ones that last month prompted Health Canada to consider working towards lower BPA levels in canned liquid infant formula and banning polycarbonate plastic baby bottles.

However, as Martin Mittelstaedt writes in the Globe and Mail, exposure levels of the hormone mimicking chemical that Health Canada currently considers safe (25 micrograms per kilogram of body weight per day) have been linked to “…adverse health outcomes including chromosomal damage to eggs in ovaries, prostate cancer, breast cancer and abnormal brain development.”

Of course, Health Canada and the Pest Management Regulatory Association also recently declared that 2,4-D, a notorious herbicide, is also safe and can continue to be used and sold in Canada. 2,4-D is found in products such as Killex, Wilson Lawn WeedOut, WeedEx and Later’s Weed Stop. According to the Toronto Board of Public Health, who has banned the cosmetic use of the product on lawns, 2,4-D has been linked to neurological and reproductive effects, and some forms of cancer. But hey, if it’s applied properly, you’ll be fine. Really. (Just don’t let your child crawl across the lawn.)

As for the canned goods, you can take Health Canada at their word. Or, you can apply the “precautionary principle” yourself and choose BPA-free cans, such as those used by Eden food (with the exception of their canned tomatoes – drat).

What will you do?