European MEPs to consider ban of bisphenol in food packaging

Today (Thursday 3 November) Members of the European Parliament will conduct a vote to consider an amendment to a report that calls for prohibition on the use of Bisphenol-A (BPA) in food contact materials.

Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) will vote on the report regarding the implementation of EU laws on food packaging, a vote that will include an amendment to the report, which calls for a ban on the use of Bisphenol-A (BPA) in food contact materials.

The report sent out by the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, calls upon the European Commission to come up with a set of EU wide regulations for all food packaging. The report further urges regulators to recognise that pregnant and breastfeeding women are even more vulnerable to the effects of hazardous chemical exposures- even at low doses.

Breast Cancer UK has welcomed the proposed amendment that calls for a complete ban on BPA in food contact materials, due to the notion that several studies suggest a potential link between BPA and breast cancer risk. 

Breast Cancer UK has already responded to EU Commission proposals to lower migration levels of BPA in food contact materials and urged the Commission not only to ban BPA but to extend the ban to other bisphenols which may be used as BPA substitutes.

BPA has already been banned from use in all food packaging in France, and is banned in packaging of foods intended for children under three years old in Sweden, Denmark and Belgium.

Breast Cancer UK has written to UK MEPs asking them to support this report and the amendment calling for an EU-wide ban on BPA.