BPA in food

What is BPA?

Bisphenol A, also known as BPA, is an industrial chemical that’s commonly used in household plastics and food packaging.

It’s primarily used to make hard, clear plastic (known as polycarbonate) that’s found in a huge array of products, including rigid food and beverage storage containers.

BPA is also found in epoxy resins, which are very thin plastic coatings used to line the inside of some food and beverage cans to prevent corrosion, protect quality and taste, and extend shelf-life.

BPA is known to move (aka “leaching”) from both plastic products and epoxy-coated metal cans into the food or drinks we consume. High temperatures and extended use increase leaching.

Why is BPA a concern?

  1. BPA has been classified as an endocrine-disrupting chemical. BPA acts like the hormone estrogen in animal and human bodies. The presence of estrogenic activity for too long or at the wrong time during fetal development has been associated with a number of different health problems.
  2. BPA leaches from packaging or storage containers  contaminating the food and drinks we consume. Leaching increases when those containers are damaged or heated (including from washing in hot water).
  3. BPA exposure is widespread. A survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that approximately 95% of Americans have detectable levels of BPA in their bodies—and children have the highest levels. The chemical has been found in blood, urine, sweat, amniotic fluid, and breast milk.
  4. BPA exposure — even at very low levels — has increasingly been linked to negative health outcomes. That includes impacts on the:
    • Immune system, including overacting inflammatory responses associated with asthma and wheezing.
    • Reproductive system, including infertility and early puberty.
    • Metabolic system, including obesity and Type 2 diabetes.
    • Neurological system, including learning and behavioral conditions such as anxiety, hyperactivity, and depression.
    • Cardiovascular system, including high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease.
    • Breast and prostate cancer.

What’s happening to reduce our exposure to BPA?

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) — the agency responsible for regulating chemicals in food — first approved BPA in the early 1960s. But concerns about BPA were raised as early as the 1970s, and, in 1993, scientists at Stanford University found BPA leaching into their lab experiments from polycarbonate flasks. This led to a flurry of new research — in particular, studies that focused on BPA’s similarity to estrogen.

Since then, despite mounting evidence that link BPA exposures to multiple health harms, FDA has continued to maintain that BPA is safe at low levels of exposure. The agency has taken this stance based on its own limited data, while giving less importance to evidence gathered by numerous academic and government institutions. 

In 2021, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) released a draft report (PDF, 7.1MB) that concluded BPA is a risk to human health—and poses particularly high risk to the immune system. In the wake of that report, EDF together with physicians, scientists, and public health and other environmental organizations submitted a petition [PDF, 542KB] to FDA on April 6, 2022. Our petition called on the agency to rescind its approvals for BPA in adhesives and coatings and to set strict limits on its use in plastics that contact food.

As of March 2024, we have yet to receive a response from FDA on that petition. In the meantime, EFSA released its finalized report showing that BPA is harmful at levels hundreds of times lower than what was previously been considered safe and the European Commission proposed regulations that would ban most uses of BPA in plastics, metal can coatings, and other uses in contact with food.

Additional resources

How we're reducing harmful chemicals in food