NYTimes urges “wise consumers” to avoid BPA

The New York Times (1/21, A38) editorializes, “The Food and Drug Administration has raised its level of concern over the safety of bisphenol-A, or BPA, an industrial chemical found in baby bottles and the linings of canned goods and other consumer products.” Calling this “a welcome shift in attitude by an agency that seemed bent, during the Bush administration, on minimizing the potential for harm,” the Times asserts the action “sheds little light, for now, on how dangerous the chemical might be in the small amounts that leach out” or “how rigorously it should be regulated.” Therefore, the Times urges “wise consumers…to avoid BPA” for as long as it takes the agency “to amass more conclusive evidence” on the chemical’s safety.