Wallet Mouth

Amuse-bouche: DIY toys

With all the recent reports about toxic plastic toys, it's worth remembering that you can always make your own (though, granted, not of plastic).

Happy Father's Day!

It's a strange and wonderful thing to have your first Mother's Day or Father's Day as a parent. Mr. Wallet Mouth and I celebrated his day with a delicious South Indian brunch and some poking around in bookstores. Mini Mouth was remarkably well behaved.

Speaking of the baby, maybe it's because of her that I responded so quickly to a recent email from the Environmental Working Group's Ken Cook appealing for money to help fund the organization's Kid-Safe campaign, which officially launches today. Turns out Cook is also a new parent. "It's my first Father's Day," he wrote, "and we couldn't be more excited, but I definitely don't want a tie covered in stain-proofing chemicals. Instead I want to start fighting for a law that will protect kids from dangerous toxic chemicals, including the stain-proof kind."

So I slung them some cash for an e-card to Mr. Wallet Mouth. Happy Father's Day, and may we look forward to a less-polluted world in the future.

The long neck of the law (of supply and demand)

Ah, the drive to consume. Is anyone immune? I'm certainly not, as this anecdote shows.

Last week, after going to mom-and-baby yoga class, a friend and I, infants in tow, stopped in at Natural Resources, our local pregnancy-and-baby-stuff shop, so I could pick up a pacifier. As we stood at the register, my friend inquired about a toy called Sophie the Giraffe. "We don't have any in stock right now, but we're expecting some soon," the employee told her. "Do you want to put yourself on the waiting list? They tend to fly off the shelves once they come in." Soon a binder appeared on the counter, and my friend was adding her name to the list.

"What's Sophie the Giraffe?" I asked her.

"Oh, they're just these cute toys that are popular," she replied as the cashier put the binder away. "They're supposed to be all-natural and safe for babies."

"Excuse me, can I see that binder?" I heard myself say. "I think I'll put my name in too."

That night as I told Mr. Wallet Mouth about my succumbing to consumer whim, I was forced to admit that I had no idea why Sophie the Giraffe was all the rage, nor did I even have the slightest idea what she looked like. I just figured that any toy with a waiting list at Natural Resources must be worth something. Besides, our cub needed a new enrichment item.

"We call it baby crack. Infants just love it, for some reason," the cashier told me yesterday when I asked what the deal was with Sophie. The order had come in, and the giraffe was now in my hot little hand. While Sophie is cute and soft and made in Europe of safe materials (and endowed with a squeaky noisemaker inside), I wouldn't necessarily have pegged her as the be-all-end-all for babes. But what do I know? The true judge will be Mini-Mouth, who was presented with her new treasure this morning.

A formula for confusion?

Speaking of sugar, today's New York Times features a story about a controversy surrounding Similac's organic infant formula. I found it interesting because it represents another angle on the question of what "organic" means, something I'm currently exploring in the area of personal-care products.

Consumers associate the word "organic" with "healthier," but that's arguably not the case here. That's because Similac's formula is sweetened with sucrose, as opposed to lactose, and pediatricians worry that it could increase the risk of childhood obesity. 

In Europe, the article points out, formulas sweetened with sucrose will be prohibited by the end of 2009, thanks to the recommendation of the EU's Scientific Committee on Food, "which found that sucrose provided no particular nutritional advantages, could, in rare cases, bring about a fatal metabolic disorder, and might lead to overfeeding."

Technically speaking, Similac's product is organic—the sugar cane was grown in accordance with the USDA's standards, after all—but does the choice of organic sucrose over organic lactose as an ingredient violate the spirit of "organic"? And if it does, would it be desirable or even possible for the "organic" designation to try to control such things?

The A-to-Z’s on BPA

Someone just forwarded me a great resource for parents who are concerned about all this BPA business: a blog called Z Recommends and its report on BPA in children’s feeding products, which rates makers of products such as pacifiers and sippy cups. Besides the online directory, there’s a mobile component. Just text-message “zrecs” followed by the name of the company you’re curious about to 69866 to receive info on your cell phone.

The blog points out one problem that I’d never considered: while the main functional part of any given children’s product may indeed be BPA-free, that’s not necessarily true of the item’s other parts, which are equally likely to end up in kids’ mouths. The “shield” on a pacifier, for example, isn’t meant to be sucked on, but we all know how that goes. Said shields are often made of polycarbonate plastic, which contains the endocrine-disrupting chemical.

The ratings—there are four categories, ranging from Excellent to Poor—are based on “product quality, innovation, the range of products a company offers, their stance on BPA and their openness about sharing information about their products.” Z Recommends also provides a list of companies whose wares are all BPA-free, so you can trust anything they make. I found it heartening that there are 30 names on that list.   

Z Recommends isn’t just for parents, by the way. It’s chock-full of informative posts such as this one, which talks about Wal-Mart U.S., Nalgene, and BPA-related company claims that warrant skepticism.

BPA blowup

Finally the mainstream media is talking about bisphenol A (BPA), a chemical found in many plastics, in light of a new brief by the National Toxicology Program that expresses concern over the substance. As the report puts it, “the possibility that bisphenol A may impact human development cannot be dismissed.”

It’s especially nice to see more light being shed on the fact that the FDA based its sketchy “BPA is safe” stance on two studies funded by the plastic industry [link], ignoring hundreds of government and academic studies that raised red flags about BPA.

In my recent post about the chemical, I expressed surprise to learn that it’s found not only in baby bottles but also in aluminum food cans and beverage cans and bottles. Turns out it’s in numerous other everyday objects, such as CDs, too. Today's Washington Post story on the issue quotes an overseer of the report as saying, “It’s everywhere.... Your cell phone is probably made out of it.”

In Canada, as the New York Times reports, the government is expected to label it toxic in the coming days. Meanwhile, big retailers there, such as Wal-Mart and Home Depot, are already pulling BPA-containing products from their shelves.

Much of the focus in recent reports is on BPA’s presence in baby bottles, sippy cups, and infant formula containers. That’s as it should be, since developing bodies are more affected by endocrine disruptors than adult bodies are.

The Washington Post story points out that BornFree, a company that makes BPA-free baby bottles, can’t keep up with demand. I don’t know about other parents, though, but I’m sticking to glass bottles. Today it’s BPA, but tomorrow...?

FDA: WTF?

More bisphenol A blues: This story from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that the FDA deemed BPA to be safe at current exposure levels based on two studies ... paid for by an arm of the trade group the American Chemistry Council.

Endocrine disruptor in a can

The new issue of Nutrition Action Healthletter just arrived, and one of the articles talks about bisphenol A (BPA), an endocrine disruptor that’s found in polycarbonate, which is commonly used to make plastic cutlery, sippy cups, and baby bottles. For those who don’t know what exactly endocrine disruptors are (I didn’t), they’re substances that mimic hormones (estrogen, in BPA’s case), thereby messing with the endocrine system, which regulates reproductive and developmental processes.

Scientists are divided on which particular health ills can be attributed to BPA—some believe it’s associated with increased rates of breast and prostate cancer, early-onset puberty, type 2 diabetes, and ADHD; others simply worry that it may affect the maturing brain in unspecified ways—but I say, why wait to find out? The article quotes the National Institute of Environmental Health Science’s Chris Portier as saying that “there’s sufficient evidence now to give people who want to be prudent—especially parents—a reason to avoid BPA.”

I’d vaguely heard of BPA as something to avoid in plastic water bottles (I’ve consequently said good-bye to my old Nalgenes and bought some Klean Kanteens) and baby bottles (we’re using glass ones). And it’s pretty infuriating that the substance is used in products designed to go into the mouths of kids, whose developing bodies are the most vulnerable to endocrine disruptors.

But what I didn’t know is that BPA is also found in the epoxy resin that lines food and beverage cans. “Close to 100 percent of our exposure [to BPA] occurs this way,” NIEHS’s Michael Shelby is quoted as saying.

The story suggests avoiding canned beverages and buying foods that are packaged in cartons or pouches rather than cans.

Mr. Wallet Mouth and I aren’t big on soda or any other canned beverages, but our cupboard does contain a good supply of canned foods, mostly beans, stewed tomatoes, and the odd veggie chili. So I was glad to read that there is one company, Eden Foods, using cans without the epoxy resin. According to Eden’s website, its custom-made cans have baked-on oleoresinous c-enamel lining, oleoresin being “a natural mixture of an oil and a resin extracted from various plants, such as pine or balsam fir.”

Having been recently turned on to who owns whom in the organic food sector, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Eden is an independent company, family owned and operated since 1968.

Cool, I thought to myself. I’ll start buying all my canned food from Eden. The only downside, I discovered, is that Eden offers only one product in a can: organic beans.

Clearly it’s time for other food producers to get on the oleoresinous c-enamel bandwagon, because I have a feeling that as more and more consumers get educated about BPA, this issue is going to amount to far more than a hill of beans.

Baby steps

Nothing like a new baby to slow down your blogging! Our new Mouth to feed is a joy, but it’s safe to say that the first two weeks of parenthood have kicked my butt.

Speaking of butts, one bloggable nugget has emerged from the recent haze of sleep deprivation and poop overload. It has to do with the derriere—specifically, what to cover the soft, newborn bum with. (And don’t even talk to me about elimination communication. At least not at this stage of the game.)

Anyone who has even thought about procreating is probably aware of the environmental debate over disposable vs. cloth diapers. Disposable nappies aren’t very earth-friendly to produce and take forever to biodegrade; cloth ones require water and electricity to clean—and if you use a diaper service, you have to factor in the transportation factors as well. It’s a classic case of the importance of considering embodied energy.

Now there’s a new entrant to the debate: gDiapers, which feature a reusable cloth outer layer and a biodegradable liner that you flush down the toilet. According to the company’s site, the liner has been given two thumbs up from the Cradle to Cradle guys. Now, gDiapers are old news to parents with diaper-wearing kids, but Mr. Wallet Mouth and I only recently learned of them, and I’m happy to report that (a) they fit our infant’s bum fairly well (they don’t work for every baby) and (b) we’ve not found them to be too much of a pain in the ass, though they are more work than disposables.

Also, the gDiapers website says the company works with China Labour Watch “to keep an eye on the mill we use to ensure workers are treated fairly and working conditions are constantly being improved.”

Still, I can’t help but feel guilty about all the extra water we’re using with all these additional flushes, especially since we live in an apartment with a regular, non-low-flow toilet. One of these days I’ll get around to rectifying that, but probably not until I’ve had more sleep.