Thermal Food Labels Leach Chemicals into Fish, Meat, Cheese and Produce

 A few years ago, I wrote a blog about toxic store receipts - the ones that are printed on thermal paper and have Bisphenol A (BPA) in them. Our local grocery store had transitioned away from all phenols, which is amazing! Because BPA is an endocrine disruptor and can cause all sorts of health issues for those who handle receipts - think store staff, bookkeepers and home owners who do monthly finances and reconcile their receipts against their credit card statements.

We first heard about BPA several years ago because it used to be in plastic water bottles. Big brouhaha happened over that and now we all drink out of metal water bottles. Well... apparently, “there's more BPA in a single thermal paper receipt than the total amount that would leach out from a polycarbonate water bottle used for many years" (see 2014 Consumer Reports).

While many stores are transitioning away from BPA in their thermal paper, they are now using BPS (Bisphenol S) which is equally as toxic as BPA. Sigh.

But wait... it's not just water bottles and thermal paper receipts we need to be concerned about! Now... there is the possibility that it is leaching into our fresh produce, meat, fish and cheese. 

Thermal Food Labels

Yep. Those labels. You know the ones - they are every single meat package and have the price and cooking instructions on them. They are thermal printed and contain BPS and other BPA-like chemicals. Then there's the cheese price labels... and the fish price labels... and the veggie price labels if you get a package with more than one veg.

But... but... they are wrapped in plastic film! How can chemicals leach through plastic film??? Don't ask me... I'm not a chemical engineer... but apparently it can happen. Maybe the chemical film changes it's chemical composition where it's in contact with the thermal label?

Ultimately, we've just traded in one toxic chemical for another. Bugger. And it makes me wonder about my local grocery store which has "BPA-free" printed on the back of their receipts. Are they really free of toxic chemicals or did they just trade in BPA for BPS? I've reached out to them and we'll see what they say.

As for the cheese, meat and fish labels... well... you can do several things:

• bag produce yourself rather than buying those pre-package packs wrapped on top of a Styrofoam tray 
• shop for meat at the butcher or fish counter
• bring your own container or aluminum foil and ask them to use that for packaging instead.
• or ask to have the label placed under the Styrofoam tray instead of on top
• ask your grocery store if their labels are "phenol-free" (not just BPA free)

Europe is way ahead of us on this and if they can do it... so can we!

Further Reading

CBC article on BPS in Thermal Food Labels - https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/bps-food-labels-1.6792373

Avoiding Toxic Store Receipts

You've likely heard about BPA - Bisphenol A. It's a type of plastic that has been (and sometimes is still being) used in canned food, baby bottles, plastic water bottles and store receipts (those thermal paper ones).

BPA is incredibly bad for humans and is a known endocrine disruptor. Research indicates that BPA is linked to an increased risk of breast and prostate cancers, cardiovascular disease, and reproductive and brain development abnormalities. New studies even suggest it may be connected to autism spectrum disorder.

Pretty much everyone agrees that BPA is Bad News!

So what can we do about it? One option is to only buy plastic consumer goods that are labelled BPA-Free... although that is no guarantee that the item is actually free of BPA. Another option is to use glass and metal containers instead of plastic containers... good-bye vintage Tupperware. And definitely never ever microwave food in plastic containers... ever. BPA leaches out of plastic even faster when it's heated up... one of the reasons why plastic water bottles should not be left in the sun.

These are all good options but... one scientist noted that the really bad culprit is... thermal paper receipts. Apparently, “there's more BPA in a single thermal paper receipt than the total amount that would leach out from a polycarbonate water bottle used for many years" (see 2014 Consumer Reports).

This is bad news for store cashiers but also anyone who needs to handle receipts for accounting purposes. And it's not just store receipts. Thermal paper receipts are used for:

• airline boarding passes
• airline luggage tags
• train tickets
  
• movie tickets
• sporting event tickets
• amusement park tickets
• prescription bottle labels
• packaged supermarket items such as deli meats and cheeses
• fax paper
• lottery tickets

Yikes! So what is the solution? Well... there are a few options:

1. Wear those blue nitrile gloves when handling receipts.
2. Decline paper receipts wherever you have the option of getting an emailed receipt.
3. Don't carry receipts loose in your wallet, where the BPA can rub off on other things. Store them in a plastic bag.
4. Wash your hands (with soap and water) as soon as possible after touching receipts.
5. Don't use alcohol-based sanitizers before or after handling receipts since that just increases the skin's ability to absorb BPA! Well... that's fun in the age of Covid when we are all using hand sanitizers like mad.
6. Don't handle thermal paper if you are pregnant... and keep it away from kids too. Prenatal and early life exposure to BPA poses the greatest potential health risks.
   

This sudden interest in BPA was triggered for me by a receipt that I received from a local grocery store.

The backside of the receipt is not typical of other receipts. See... it's made by EcoChit and states that the paper is (a) sustainably sourced, (b) 100% BPA and BPS free and (c) One tree planted for every case of paper used.

Loud kudos to Country Grocer for going this route! I had a look at a stack of other receipts on my desk...

• Lowes
• Superstore
• Mobil Gas Bar
• Shopper's Drug Mart
• Winners
• Home Depot
• various credit card machine receipts

Out of all of those, only Winners has a note on the back of their receipt saying it is BPA-Free. Home Depot has an FSC notice - that the paper is from responsible sources, but nothing about BPA.

There is a call to ban toxic thermal paper receipts in Canada, particularly from the UCFW union. I did find news that Loblaws (Superstore & Shopper's Drug Mart) plans to ban all Bisphenols (BPA, BPS and others) from their receipts by the end of 2021. So that is good news. But isn't it about time that this went Canada-wide...

Canada banned BPA from baby bottles in 2010, declaring it a toxic substance. But Canada did not ban it from all food and consumer products. Due to consumer concern, however, many companies did voluntarily remove BPA from their products. Home Depot receipts. for example, have been BPA free for over 10 years. So is all of this just a moot point?

Nope... you see, many companies just phased out BPA and used BPS or other Bisphenols instead. Sigh. All of which are just as toxic as BPA. Seriously...

So, I went and had a look at the EcoChit site which produces the Country Grocer receipts. Those receipts are completely phenol free but do use a chemical called Pergafast instead of the phenols... What is this stuff?

Well, Pergafast is also a chemical but... it would appear that it is much less easily absorbed into the skin than BPA and BPS... at least according to a 2015 study.

All of this does make me wonder why Canada doesn't just ban all phenol products... In the meantime, maybe it's time to praise the likes of Country Grocer and Loblaws and start poking at places like Home Depot...