BPA-Free Bottles... Best For Baby

As a parent you want to ensure that everything you do for your baby is the very best. What you use to feed them with is no different. Bottles will be a big part of your child’s life for the first few years, and as such it’s important to know a thing or two about BPA.

- Loren Stow

Everywhere we look these days we find bottles promising to be “BPA-Free”, but what exactly is BPA? Is it just another fad or is there really something behind the movement away from this raw material commonly found in plastic?

WHAT EXACTLY IS BPA?

Bisphenol A (BPA) is a chemical used when making hard plastics like baby bottles, plates and cups, to name a few. It has become apparent in recent years, and due to the efforts of watchdog groups around the globe, that this chemical is dangerous to the body, especially when it is ingested, as is the case with bottles and food containers.

CANSA, South Africa’s own watchdog group, is crusading to ban all products containing BPA aimed at babies in South Africa.

SO WHY IS BPA BAD?

BPA is an endocrine-disrupting compound (EDC). In simple terms, this means that once ingested into the body, BPA disrupts our delicate hormonal balance. In this case, it pretends to be like the hormone oestrogen – and for this reason it is also called a xenoestrogen (‘xeno’ means ‘fake’).