The European Commission has just started a process to restrict the use of thousands of chemical substances present in everyday products, among which are several endocrine disruptors, which alter the hormonal balance.
Nicolás Olea (Granada, 67 years old) has been studying the effect of these compounds on the body for more than three decades, ranging from obesity and diabetes to infertility and learning disabilities.
This professor of Medicine at the University of Granada knows that the future ban will have to be agreed upon with the EU Member States and may take years, but he believes that there is no turning back.
“We have been denouncing it for 30 years and now it seems that the Administrations are finally beginning to listen”, he sums up.
Ask.
In which products are endocrine disruptors present?
Response.
Many everyday objects have them, especially plastic packaging, but also cosmetics, clothing and even food.
Q.
What effects do they produce on health?
A.
Endocrine disruptors
hack
the hormonal message and produce effects such as neurobehavioral deficits, learning problems, and are even related to the incidence of syndromes such as Asperger's and autism.
Other effects are endometriosis and poor seminal quality, which translates into increased infertility.
In fact, there are more and more assisted reproduction clinics in all our cities.
They also produce metabolic disruption, which leads to obesity, hypertension and type 2 diabetes, and which can cause many health problems and enormous health costs for the country.
More information
Brussels starts the process to restrict thousands of chemical substances harmful to health and the environment
P.
Is that exposure the same for all people?
A.
The most detrimental effects occur from early exposures to endocrine disruptors in early life (embryo, fetus, and early childhood).
The exposures that occur at that time have late consequences, the most exposed people are the young.
The environment in which childhood developed in the fifties and sixties was made of wood, marble and glass, but from then on it was made of plastic, and that is having negative effects.
Furthermore, the safety tests of these substances never take into account the combined effect of endocrine disruptors.
Q.
What would you then advise pregnant women and babies to avoid?
A.
Many cosmetics and perfumes contain endocrine disruptors, so all those that contain them should be avoided: look for them without dimethicone, camphene and phenoxyethanol.
The latter is also found in the hydroalcolic gel for the hands.
You also have to stay away from those that carry benzophenones, parabens and ultraviolet filters.
In food, it is better not to eat tuna, grouper and other large fish that have a lot of mercury, and also the heads of shrimp, which contain cadmium.
If you can, eat local, seasonal, unprocessed and organic: with this you avoid processing and, often, packaging, which also usually provides endocrine disruptors.
You have to be careful of cosmetic and food exposures because they reach the breast milk in 12 hours.
P.
What do you think of the EU roadmap to ban thousands of these substances?
R.
It is a very good initiative, because finally the European Commission accepts that endocrine disruption exists.
It is the definitive finishing touch for perfluorinated substances, which make paper and cardboard impermeable to grease and water, so they are present in many food containers.
Some 800 kinds of them have direct access to the agency, so they will have to be withdrawn from the market when the ban is confirmed.
The document also mentions PVC, which are highly polluting plastics with a lousy recycling system, but they also use phthalates, which allow a hard PVC to be converted into a flexible element like vinyl and which are also endocrine disruptors.
The roadmap also talks about removing bisphenols, and not just bisphenol A, which has 432
primes
[similar substances] of which 43 are endocrine disruptors (such as bisphenol F or bisphenol S).
Dvd 1096 03.03.22 Nicolas Olea, Professor of Medicine at the University of Granada, expert in endocrine disruptors.
Photographed in MadridPhoto: Santi BurgosSanti Burgos
Q.
Have any of these substances been banned already?
R.
Bisphenol A (BPA) products for babies were banned in 2011 on the precautionary principle, but were previously used for baby bottles.
In 2020, the EU already regulated cash receipts with bisphenol A, which many young women handled, but other bisphenols are still used, which have the same effect on the body.
In addition, in recent months nonylphenol has been banned in cleaning products, chlorpyrifos (insecticide), mancozeb (fungicide)... Toys with phthalates have also been banned, a material that makes plastic more flexible, which, however, is present on nursery floors made with PVC, and also on plastic gloves and shower curtains.
As for perfluorinated compounds, which are also used in thermal insulation such as goretex, the Commission has already banned seven, but the catalog has about 4,700.
All these products have been on the market for more than 30 years, and then one day they are bad.
Who takes responsibility for all those years of exposure?
P.
What is missing to regulate?
R.
The European Food Safety Agency [EFSA, in English] hit the nail on the head in February by submitting for consultation the reduction of bisphenol A in food applications by 100,000 times, something that is expected to arrive at the end of the year.
The evidence is overwhelming for them to disappear from human-applied products, but it is inexcusable that they take 30 years to do so.
The Commission's roadmap, for its part, talks a lot about industrial products, but talks less about cosmetics and perfumes, so they do not mention benzophenones, parabens and ultraviolet filters.
There are about 1,500 endocrine disruptors and there is still a lot to be done.
The action is brave, but very slow.
Q.
How will we notice these changes in our daily lives?
A.
Single-use dishes in restaurants often contain perfluorinated substances;
plastic cutlery, phthalates;
canned food, bisphenols;
and water bottles, phthalates.
So in the future there will be less plastic in food packaging and applications, which will reduce human exposure to endocrine disruptors and also waste.
We will have to go back to reusable containers in restaurants.
The new waste law already talks about eliminating single-use plastics and boosting tap water.
As for epoxy resins, a source of bisphenol A, they are present inside the cans, so it will be necessary to find another material for them.
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