Will Drinking from Plastic Bottles Kill You?
A recent fad states that plastic water bottles leech toxic chemicals. Is it true?
| Skeptoid #60 August 09, 2007 Podcast transcript | Listen | Subscribe |
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Today we're going to place our plastic water bottle, which has already been used three or four times, in the car on a hot sunny day, and then drink its noxious chemical contents to see if we get sick and die. The idea is that chemicals in the plastic get released into the bottle's contents when the bottle is reused, and especially if it's heated up.
So let's point our skeptical eye at the issue and see whether it has any merit. Do we need to be concerned about this? The only really fair answer is that it's a complicated question. "Plastic" is not a single compound. There are almost as many different types of plastic as there are types of substances contained by them. Some plastics do contain poisonous chemicals. Some plastics do leech chemicals into liquids. In some plastics, this process can be accelerated by heat. The reason for this variety is to provide the product distributor with enough choices that they can select a plastic type that's best for their product. This permits a distributor of drinking water to use a bottle that is absolutely safe to contain water for humans under the whole temperature range that the bottle is likely to be subjected to. But, put gasoline into that same bottle, and you might see that plastic dissolve away. Plastics are designed for their particular application, and misusing a plastic product can produce undesired consequences.
One time, in college, I was moving to a new apartment a block or two away. My brother and I had built a koi pond, and we needed to move the fish and store them long enough to build a new pond at the new place. We went out and bought a cheap plastic kids' wading pool. We put it in the garage and filled it with the hose, treated the water with all the usual fish-friendly chemicals, and walked the koi over in buckets and placed them in their new temporary home. Well, we learned a harsh lesson about chemicals in plastics. After a day or two the koi didn't look so good. Some of them died. Then all of them died. It was pretty horrible, because, and I'll spare you the details, they didn't look very good. We had no idea what the problem was. Was it the shock of being transported? Did we not add enough stuff to kill the chlorine? On a whim I called the manufacturer of the swimming pool and asked if they knew any reason why this would happen. They did. On products like this, they always add a mold inhibitor to the plastic. In this case, they used cyanide. For a children's pool, they add a safe low level of cyanide that's harmless to the children, but is enough to prevent mold from growing that would make the pool gross and unsightly. Evidently, a level of cyanide that's safe for a human is lethal for a fish, since they breathe it directly into their blood through their gills. The guy we spoke to was the company's head scientist, and he seemed to relish this rare opportunity to discuss his work. He went into all sorts of detail about their different products, and how they use the right plastic for each different job. Ever since then, whenever I work on a koi pond, I always call the manufacturer of any plastic products I'm using and talk to their chemists.
Here's the long and the short of it. Whether you're microwaving food in a plastic container, refilling your plastic water bottle, or making a koi pond, use plastic products that are intended for that use. The manufacturers do employ chemists to determine how best to package their products to ensure their safety, this process is strictly policed by the FDA, and this is always going to be more reliable than random information you read on the Internet or receive in a chain email.
And yes, it is our good old friend the Internet that seems to be the basis for this particular fear's place in popular culture. For example, there's one hoax email going around that says Sheryl Crow believes she contracted breast cancer from toxic chemicals by drinking water from a bottle that had been left in a car. Not true. Sheryl Crow doesn't claim this, there are no chemicals in water bottles that have been linked to cancer, and heating a water bottle to car temperatures does not leech anything into the water. There's another chain email that says freezing your water bottle, like so many people do, will leech dioxin into your water. Again, not true. No plastic containers designed for containing food or drinks contain dioxin, and colder temperatures stabilize plastics; it's heat that will accelerate their breakdown.
Most famously, a 2001 study by the University of Idaho found that reuse of plastic water bottles does release risky levels of diethylhexyl adipate (DEHA) into the water, which is potentially carcinogenic. This study was widely reported by the popular media and largely touched off the chain emails and most of the current perceived controversy. But is it true? No. Such a paper was written, but it was not a formal study. It was, in fact, merely the master's thesis of one student. It was not subjected to any peer review, and cannot accurately be characterized as a study performed by the university. It does not represent any position held by the University of Idaho. And unfortunately, it was not well performed research. DEHA is not classified by the FDA as a carcinogen, but more importantly, DEHA is not used in the type of plastic water bottles that the student evaluated. But it is used in many other plastics, and is present in a lab setting. "For this reason", concluded the International Bottled Water Association (which is, granted, not a very objective source), "the student's detection is likely to have been the result of inadvertent lab contamination." The FDA requires a higher level of scrutiny than that applied by the student writing his paper. DEHA is actually approved for food contact applications, but the fact that it's not present in the type of plastic that was studied, discredits the entire paper. But the mass media is often more interested in headlines than facts, so the dangers of reusing water bottles had no trouble becoming a fixture in pop culture.
Some people allege a conspiracy among distributors of bottled water, who know that their products are poisonous but who have analyzed the cost savings against the projected lawsuits from wrongful death and have concluded that it's more profitable to sell dangerous products. I do not find this theory very compelling. First, the products demonstrably do not contain the toxic agents claimed by the theory. Second, like all conspiracy theories, it's just too implausible that something of that magnitude could be kept secret for so long by so many people and so many victims, with nobody ever blowing a whistle or calling a newspaper. If corporate Men in Black were sent out to silence the whistleblowers and families of the victims, this would just multiply the number of reasons for someone to blow the whistle. This conspiracy theory just doesn't hold any water — pun intended.
There are absolutely plastics that are unsafe for containing or heating food. Look what happened to my koi. Or, let's say you sealed some food inside a length of PVC pipe and heated it over a campfire. Is that safe? I don't know, but I wouldn't eat it. Just like everything else in life, use products for their intended purpose, and you will not have any problem. Be assured that intended use of water bottles does include high temperature cycling. You will not get sick from any reasonable use of a water bottle or other food-containing plastic product.
References
© 2009 Skeptoid.com
Discuss!
5 most recent comments | Show all 48 comments
Remember, you should always read with skepticism the comments of anyone too lame to put their real name & city.
I really agree that the question is about whether reusing plastic bottles is HURTFUL to our health or not? The question is not about whether it reusing plastic bottles kills!
alex, las vegas
April 03, 2009 10:36am
Something I thought of after listening to the Pacific garbage patch episode: If plastic breaks down under UV radiation while floating out in the ocean, isn't it possible that this could happen to an extent with bottled water? I understand that the plastic that's floating in the ocean has much more time exposed to direct sunlight than the average plastic bottle thrown in the back seat of my car, but isn't it logical to assume that some breakdown occurs, and individual particles of plastic could break free and be floating around in the water? Would individual plastic molecules even be harmful if ingested?
Burn Fx, Camarillo, CA
May 03, 2009 2:21pm
This skeptoid.com article is well written. I was shocked to find out how much incorrect information is floating about the internet on this topic, this was one of the more balanced and credible views I found. But I think you have to be skeptical on both sides of the argument. The "studies" that show bottles are unsafe may not hold up, but showing that such studies are flawed is not the same as producing studies showing a products safety.
I have a lot of insider information on this topic and the only type of bottle I wouldn't use for bottled water is recycling code 3, PVC, but I've never seen the industry use that type of plastic for bottled water (PVC is used for water pipes, but the the pipes are hard so don't contain much plasticizer so those don't worry me) and maybe some 7's (7 is other, so it really depends with on what the 7 is, some may be safer than others).
Gregory, Fullerton CA
May 14, 2009 1:22pm
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From:
Sent: Friday, 12 June 2009 2:52 p.m.
ToSubject: BPA plastic contamination
Thought you may be interested in the results of this new study
Bisphenol-a BPA Plastics Update:
The FDA said last year that BPA poses no threat to human health drinking from a polycarbonate water bottle (though looks like data may have been biased)
It now looks like that drinking from polycarbonate bottles for just one week can prove harmful. That's according to a new study out last month by the Harvard School of Public Health.
>
> Harvard scientists invited 77 students to participate in this groundbreaking study, the first to emphasis just how quickly the body begins to absorb BPA from food or beverage containers.
> The students began the study with a 7-day wash-out period. During that time, they only drank from stainless steel containers in order to minimize BPA exposure. The BPA in their urine was then measured and used as a baseline.
> On the 8th day, students began drinking from clear polycarbonate water bottles that were known to contain BPA. The students drank from the containers for just one week. (Polycarbonate bottles are clear, hard, non-breakable, and refillable. They usually have a pop- top or flip-top lid for drinking.) If it's got a recycling #7 on it, you know it's got BPA in it.
>
> The BPA found in the students' urine after just one week of drinking from the plastic containers spiked by 69 percent!
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> The students did use the water bottles properly. They didn't heat them. They didn't put them in the microwa
peter, christchurch new zealand
June 21, 2009 3:43pm
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One thing I have learnt from doing research is that it is ALL questionable. This very reasonable, let's even say friendly article proves nothing. I liked the story about the ordinary guy with his fish pond and his brother, a nice touch from a skilled narrator who is certainly not your average man next door. I don't know anything about the science of this particular plastic issue, and am taking no sides on this, but I do know you need to read all of this VERY carefully, from the internet chatter and rumour to this seemingly so reassuring article. Lets look at one part of it: "there are no chemicals in water bottles that have been linked to cancer, and heating a water bottle to car temperatures does not leech anything into the water". What temperatures is it talking about, the sort of temperatures a car can reach in very hot sunshine for hours on end, or normal temperatures, average temperatures? and what about no chemicals linked to cancer - what does that really mean? No one has done the research yet? they researched it for one day/one month/one year? too difficult to research? There is no way to prove the link to cancer?
There are as many "nutters" in the science world, with their blind faith in the scientific method and reliance on "scientific proof" as there are on the internet. Let's us all travel carefully and kindly and listen more to each other with an open mind, it is sometimes the "nutters" who end up with the nobel prize.
Holly, Abu Dhabi
March 24, 2009 8:27am