EU food safety body takes new look at baby bottle chemical

ROME (AFP) - The EU food safety watchdog EFSA said Tuesday it may review its clearance of bisphenol A for use in the manufacture of plastic baby bottles after Canada moved to ban the substance.

"EFSA is aware of the studies on bisphenol published in the United States and Canada," spokeswoman Anne-Laure Gassin told AFP. "The agency will examine whether it should review its opinion on this product, which dates from January 2007."

The European Food Safety Authority, headquartered in Parma, northern Italy, will reach a decision soon, she said.

The Canadian government announced last month that it was seeking public comment on whether to ban baby bottles made using bisphenol, considered "potentially harmful."

It would become the first country to ban the chemical compound.

A US government report last month also found that bisphenol A could endanger reproductive health and the nervous system.

EFSA said in its January 2007 risk assessment that a daily intake of 0.05 milligrammes of bisphenol A per kilogramme of body weight was tolerable, and that this amount was much greater than that ingested by infants in an average day.

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