The Truth about "BPA Free" Products

 

Storing your water in any type of Plastic, even "BPA Free" bottles, can adversely affect your health.

One day, as I was pouring myself a glass of water from the water cooler at a Venture Capital company I was working at, I noticed the assistant to the CEO was pouring herself a glass of water from the refrigerator machine instead. This surprised me, as she seemed pretty health conscious and I thought water from the cooler was the healthiest type you could possibly drink. I said, "Oh... you're drinking water from the machine instead?" Pointing to the water cooler, I said, "Is there a reason you don't like the water from this machine?"

She told me that she had done a lot of research on water, and said that the toxins from the large plastic water bottles (yes, even those big hard plastic 5 gallon bottles) can leach into the water.  I said, "Well, aren't these bottles BPA free?" And she said it didn't matter. Any type of plastic, even the BPA-free type, can leach toxins into the water. She said that the safest type of water is water that's filtered from a machine (provided the filters are changed regularly). As a little side note, I think she may have also been trying to get pregnant (it was announced a few months later that she was expecting a baby... I imagine that baby must be pretty healthy!)

I decided to do my own research, and lo and behold, she seems to be right. When bottles claim to be "BPA Free," that doesn't necessarily mean they are any more safe than plastics with BPA. It most likely means that they are simply made with a common BPA replacement, which is called bisphenol S (BPS), which may be just as harmful. According to this article:

Nearly 81 percent of Americans have detectable levels of BPS in their urine. And once it enters the body it can affect cells in ways that parallel BPA. 

You can read another eye-opening article about BPA free plastics, HERE.


The following article, from U.S. News, can be found in it's entirety, on this site.  (Please note this article has been shortened, I am just showing the highlights as it pertains to the amount of water you should drink)