Have you wondered why many teen girls are reaching puberty early these days, and boys late?
Plastics containing synthetic estrogens have been emasculating our boys (and bringing precocious puberty to our girls), along with some other factors, according to family physician and research psychologist Leonard Sax. These plastics are found in bottles holding soda, water, and other beverages.
Five factors contribute to the increasing numbers of underachieving boys and men, according to Sax. One of these is the fact that boys and men are receiving synthetic estrogens as contaminants provided by plastic water and soda bottles, baby bottles, baby toys, and pacifiers. Sax identifies water and soda bottles with a recycling number of 1 as the most prevalent culprits. These items contain BPA and phthalates, synthetic estrogens for softening the plastic.
This is not a surprise. There's been a debate among scientists about how much of these chemicals is harmful. Animal studies pinpointed the amount needed to cause cancer; the industry used that as a benchmark, allowing trace amounts that supposedly aren't enough to cause cancer.
Sax asks the question, how does taking estrogen affect a male? In the past decade or two, many of us have been drinking our water from plastic bottles. In fact, the soda manufacturers switched from aluminum cans to plastic bottles. This makes us part of an enormous experiment evaluating the effect of taking estrogen on males. Sidestepping the question of whether it might cause cancer, Sax says he thinks it makes young males placid, and causes delayed puberty.
Four other factors and the plastics additives are combining to foster a group of men and boys who are not growing up, Sax says. He cites a study that found that, 25 years ago, only 8 percent of men between the ages of 35 and 40 had not ever married. In 2006, in contrast, 22 percent were in that category, and the number was still rising. (NYT, 8/6/06, "Facing Middle Age with No Degree and No Wife" by O'Donnell and Porter)
The proportion of men aged 18-35 living at home with parents or relatives has doubled in the last 30 years. Meanwhile 36 percent of babies in the United States in 2004 were born to unmarried women. These statistics cut across all demographic groups.
Congress, through the Consumer Product Safety Commission, is banning phthalates from products sold for use by children under 12 as of August, 2009. This includes baby bottles and pacifiers.
The agency in charge of food and drink, and its containers, is the FDA, the Food and Drug Administration. In the controversy over BPA, the FDA chooses to believe the 11 industry-funded studies that show BPA is safe. But there are 104 independently funded studies showing it is hazardous, according Catherine Zandonella, MPH, writing in The Green Guide, an online magazine.
Therefore, let the buyer beware. Avoid beverages in plastic bottles (#1, 3, or 7 on the bottom, if you want to check). Especially, avoid allowing the full bottles to get warm, a condition in which the chemical is more likely to leach. In addition, avoid drinking soda from such bottles because the acid will leach the chemical out. And avoid warming food in the microwave in plastic containers.
Sax identifies four other factors contributing to the epidemic of men who aren't growing up:
* Requirements to sit still in kindergarten. Children these days are taught to read in kindergarten, at an age when most boys aren't ready. So they begin to hate school.
* Video games
* ADHD medications
* The lack of cultural traditions emphasizing transition to manhood
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