Growing Evidence of Conflict of Interest in FDA's Ruling on BPA

The Future Earth reported on August 24th about the Food & Drug Administration's questionable evaluation of the chemical bisphenol A in a draft report released earlier that month.

This evaluation, that FDA-regulated products containing BPA currently on the market are safe and that exposure levels to BPA from food contact materials, including for infants and children, are below those that may cause health effects was obtained by examining only plastics industry-funded studies. How did they justify excluding the hundreds of other studies that found the opposite to be true? The FDA claims that only those studies using GLP, or Good Laboratory Practices, qualified. GLP were regulations set in place in 1978 when it became clear that some commercial testing laboratories were conducting sloppy research. Meanwhile, government- funded research agencies were not required to adopt GLP because they were already adhering to the much more stringent regulations required to get non-commercial funding.

Now the current FDA, which is staffed with industry cronies placed by the Bush Administration to carry out the neoconservative agenda of de-regulation, has chosen to use GLP to eliminate from consideration all studies not funded by the chemical industry- the very people who manufacture the chemicals the FDA is supposed to regulate. Read more. But, using suspicious criteria to determine which studies to use is just the tip of the iceberg.

The BPA draft is under review by a subcommittee, which will present their assessment to the FDA's science board on Oct. 31st. The Washington Post reported on October 13th that there may be a conflict of interest. Charles Gelman, a retired head of a medical device manufacturing company and outspoken BPA proponent, donated $5 million to the University of Michigan's Risk Science Center. The acting director of the center is Martin Philbert, who is also the head of the subcommittee.

And this week, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported that FDA documents suggest that the August report was written in consultation with the plastics industry. The newspaper reviewed the body of evidence that the task force considered. It found memos with entire sections blacked out, reviews commissioned by the American Plastics Council, an arm of the American Chemistry Council [an industry group], and reviews completed by consulting firms with clients who have financial interests in the sale of bisphenol A.

By the end of this week, criticism of the FDA on this issue has intensified. FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach has been called before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and its subcommittee on Oversight and Investigation to explain the agency's decision-making relating to bisphenol A. "Specifically, why industry-funded studies provide the basis of your regulatory decisions and why the totality of the science around the chemical continues to be ignored by your science-based agency," the committee letter said.

Meanwhile, Canada placed bisphenol A on its list of toxic chemicals on October 18th. The country also banned its use in baby bottles and dedicated $1.7 million to research into the chemical. Read more.