Sports bras and athletic shirts made by some of the major global sports brands were found to contain dangerous levels of the estrogen-mimicking chemical bisphenol A, commonly known as BPA, posing a considerable risk to people’s health, according to legal notices sent by the Center for Environmental Health (CEH).
BPA—an endocrine disrupting chemical that upsets the body’s functioning through blocking or mimicking hormones—is linked to developmental and health problems mostly for young children. For adults, studies have found that high levels of the chemical results in heart problems, while experts have connected BPA to obesity, diabetes, ADHD, and other ailments, with more research pending for definitive conclusions.
The CEH has sent legal notices to Athleta, PINK, Asics, The North Face, Brooks, All in Motion, Nike, and FILA regarding sports bras, and The North Face, Brooks, Mizuno, Athleta, New Balance, and Reebok for its activewear shirt collection. Testing conducted on branded clothing showed that individual wearers were exposed to 22 times the safe limit as permitted under California law.
“Studies have shown that BPA can be absorbed through skin and end up in the bloodstream after handling receipt paper for seconds or a few minutes at a time. Sports bras and athletic shirts are worn for hours at a time, and you are meant to sweat in them, so it is concerning to be finding such high levels of BPA in our clothing,” said Kaya Allan Sugerman, director of the Illegal Toxic Threats Program at CEH.
Investigations by the agency have discovered BPA in polyester-based clothing with spandex, including socks made for infants.
“Even low levels of exposure during pregnancy have been associated with a variety of health problems in offspring,” said Dr. Jimena Diaz Leiva, science director at CEH, in the press release. The resultant abnormal developmental growth can increase the likelihood of “developing breast or ovarian cancer later in life.”
The Epoch Times reached out to Nike, Fila, New Balance, Reebok, The North Face, Mizuno, and Asics for comment. Athleta, Pink, Brooks, and All in Motion could not be reached.
California’s Proposition 65
Proposition 65, enacted as a ballot initiative in California in November 1986, requires the state to maintain a list of chemicals known to cause cancer or reproductive toxicity. It requires businesses operating within the state to provide warnings on products containing such chemicals.
The list now includes about 900 naturally-occurring and synthetic chemicals, including additives or ingredients in pesticides, common household products, foods, drugs, dyes, and solvents. Penalties for violating Proposition 65 can reach up to $2,500 per incident per day.
“The proposed maximum allowable dose level for BPA (dermal exposure from solid materials) is 3 micrograms per day,” according to a report (pdf) by the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment. This could mean that some of the branded clothing exposes its wearers to about 66 micrograms daily, based on the CEH assessment.
However, detractors of the legislation have said Proposition 65 warnings inspire terror, apathy, or confusion among people residing in California.
They say that the state has designated benign plants, such as aloe vera, in the toxic list that includes the deadly chemical benzene, raising questions about the validity of such warnings for the average consumer. Critics say that the warnings have become so ubiquitous that they’ve lost their meaning and consumers tend to simply ignore them.
The CEH has called for the athletic clothing brands to reformulate their offerings without the BPA, giving them 60 days to remedy the violation before the agency files a complaint.
Anything that says made in China is no doubt poisoned, these scumbag yellow Chinese communist Rats been trying to kill Americans since they started shipping products here, they are global scumbag terrorist they even put poison in our dog treats raw hides, anything coming from China avoid that’s why this corrupted Democrat communist government isn’t allowing Americans to produce their own Goods they’re all in on it together, to help wipe out our populations they’re taking lessons from China by poisoning and murdering their own people, this is what the domestic communist Democratic Party of the New World Order is practicing on American citizens , this way they don’t look like the demons they really are when they have to line us up and shoot us like China does to their people to hide their demonic communist genocidal agenda of euthanasia
Exactly.
Has anyone else noticed more & more clothing is being manufactured with high levels of polyester, akin to the 1960s? It’s dirt cheap for the manufacturer. BPA is not only in athletic wear. Ladies, those comfortable pullover bras…yep, BPA. In fact, some fleecewear is openly touted (to appease the green crowd) as being made with recycled plastics. And let’s hear about the formaldehyde too – the chemical in wrinkle-free clothing. I questioned a popular retailer on an open review years ago on the amount of formaldehyde in their clothing & my post was quickly zapped off.
Save the frogs!
Imagine my surprise. All designed to harm people. All this shit is made in China.
@Diane Baker. Actually not all are manufactured in China. Korea, Thailand, Mexico provide cheap labor as well. And then there are those clothing manufacturers who just use ‘Made in the USA’ because “virtually” all of the item’s parts are American made. It’s a slippery slope to the truth.
IF you research the Owners of those corporations, you will probably find a lot of the Cabal, Deep State as Ownership. When their Names are not directly used, they are represented BY “Blackrock” and Vanguard.