Cows and Chickens

It looks like poly­car­bo­nate water bott­les and food pac­ka­ging aren’t as evil as the news media wan­ted us to believe.

Health Canada thinks they are safe to use for adults. They still have some con­cerns with baby bott­les, but that’s unders­tan­da­ble since they are used for warm liquids and given to tiny humans!

Here are some inte­res­ting links:

Ques­tions and Ans­wers for Action on Bisphe­nol A Under the Che­mi­cals Mana­ge­ment Plan

Bisphe­nol A Fact Sheet

I sent an email to Moun­tain Equip­ment Co-op to see if they would be retur­ning poly­car­bo­nate bott­les to their shel­ves (since they were a catalyst in the media cir­cus) and here’s what they said:

While it is true that Health Canada has sta­ted that poly­car­bo­nate bottles/containers are safe for food grade uses by adults, the mar­ket demand for these pro­ducts has been vir­tually eli­mi­na­ted due to the uncer­tainty cast on the safety of poly­car­bo­na­tes as a result of all the media coverage.

Whether or not it is ratio­nal to do so, Cana­dians are switching to non-polycarbonate bott­les and con­tai­ners. As a result of this shif­ting demand, com­bi­ned with the avai­la­bi­lity of pro­ducts made from other mate­rials (stain­less steel, copol­yes­ter), MEC will not resume the sale of poly­car­bo­nate bott­les and containers.

It would be nice if MEC offe­red an offi­cial sta­te­ment con­si­de­ring Health Canada’s assess­ment, but they appear to be kee­ping quiet about the whole thing. I’m sure sto­res are selling a lot of new bott­les after the “scare,” and a lot of per­fectly good and use­ful poly­car­bo­nate bott­les are being sent to landfill!

I will con­ti­nue using my clas­sic Nal­gene bottles.