New Study Links Plastics To Heart Disease, Diabetes

fprintf writes "There have been a number of studies over the years, some of which have been debunked, linking plastics with human disease. Now British researchers have released a study again linking common plastics used in food/liquid storage with human disease."

Comments

Re:I haven't even rtfa, but here goes

[zyl0x]

If you didn't RTFA, how do you know their results only evidenced correlation then?

Relative risk

[R2.0]

I wonder if they will compare the instances of disease to those from food poisoning from earlier methods of food storage?

Re:Relative risk

[megamerican]

I wonder if they will compare the instances of disease to those from food poisoning from earlier methods of food storage?

Using glass jars sure caused a lot of food poisoning!

Or how about not using BPA in plastics used to store food? Is that so hard to ask? There are probably thousands of plastics that don't use BPA. Why even risk it?

Re:I haven't even rtfa, but here goes

[dreddnott]

Exactly right. "Correlation is not causation" has become more like a reflexive meme around here rather than a thoughtful addition to the conversation.

Re:I haven't even rtfa, but here goes

[pizzach]

It's called a cheap grab for mod points.

Mod parent redundant

[Al Dimond]

From TFA: "At least from this study, we cannot draw any conclusion that bisphenol A causes any health effect. As noted by the authors, further research will be needed to understand whether these statistical associations have any relevance at all for human health."

As noted by the authors. The authors, and the person TFA got a quote from, and TFA all make this concession, and you try to karma-whore by stating the obvious. Read. The. Fine. Article.

Re:I haven't even rtfa, but here goes

[antifoidulus]

Wow, did you even bother reading the article? Do you really even understand statistics? Yes, correlation is not causation, but that really doesn't add much to the conversation. Correlation is necessary but not sufficient for causation. You do realize that there is a whole branch of mathematics and analysis that tries to extract causal relationships, if they exist, from this data? Are you also aware that analysis like this is the only way we can discover certain relationships?(Well, the only feasible way anyway). Getting a bunch of statistically random people to sit in a lab and drink from either plastic or non-plastic cups for 50 years isn't really going to be possible.

If you have a genuine statistical beef with something, please actually explain it rather than smugly stating, "corelation(sic). Is. Not. Causation)

Either that or show me your PhD in statistics.

Junk food?

[Sockatume]

It's time to play the what-is-the-causation game again. Most obvious to me is that junk food, prepared food (microwave meals etc.), and soft drinks are sold in plastic containers, and these foodstuffs are generally associated with heart disease and diabetes one way or another. It'll be interesting to see what the more rigorous studies find, although I'm sure this fine pilot study will be presented as Unarguable Proof That Plastic Makes You Die And We're Not Changing Our Minds On This by the world media before the day is out.

Bad Snopes, Bad

[DynaSoar]

"some of which have been debunked"

Snopes is good at debunking (urban) myths. They are not, however, good at evaluating science. Debunking is not even an appropriate term or activity to apply to science (as stated by the poster, and as performed by Snopes). Their FAQ lists other forms of common fiction which are not urban myth, but fail to list badly researched statements by or about science among them.

Snopes reports the "debunking" coming from the International Bottled Water Association. Nobody conversant with science would accept a statement from such as biased source as authoritative. Their major hint should have come from the statement that the master's thesis was "not peer reviewed". A thesis is conducted by a student under a committee of professionals, at least one of which (the thesis supervisor) is an expert in that field. Peer review is conducted by the committee. A thesis is intended to be material suitable for rewriting into a publishable paper. It will have the committee members' names on it, in reference if not in the by-line. As professionals they will at least see to it that the result is worthy of carrying their names.

As for the quote in Snopes supposedly from Rolf Halden of Johns Hopkins that there are no dioxins in plastic, do your own research, as Snopes should have done to follow up, and as the Johns Hopkins people should have done before making the statement. Go to: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez and put in the search terms "plastic" and "dioxin".

Snopes should also have done their research on the link they provide to the Johns Hopkins PR release (not a scientific publication of any sort, and certainly not peer reviewed) making the "hoax" claim. It is not from Halden, it is from Kellog Schwab. In addition to misattribution, they fail to note that the statement is made in the context of J.H. distancing themselves from misattribution in the emails titled "John Hopkins Cancer Update" and such, not in the context of research conducted or reviewed. There is a similar J.H. missive listed among the 150 results from PubMed. It is in a J.H. publication (peer review?) and has no authors credited.

Snopes appears to have found a way to become a subject of their own scrutiny, as they have delved into science and come up as debunkable urban science myth. Stick to urban mythology, Sponesites. Science can and does take care of itself, if you dig for it in science rather than press releases. Evaluating science requires taking the specific hypothetical statements and applying scientific expertise, not merely quoting vested interests (!) who happen to disagree for reasons other than replicable evidence.

Use Glass

[llZENll]

There is a reason all chemistry beakers, bottles, and flasks are made from glass, its the only cheap inert material that doesn't on some level mix with what you are containing. Metal and plastic eventually leech out.

Rather than going overboard with the results I would follow some common sense guidelines:
1) If you are a baby or preggers then use glass containers.
2) Use glass containers for heating things in the microwave or for long term liquid storage.

Given that the vast majority of everything we drink and eat these days is either stored in plastic or touches plastic at some point I think its almost impossible to go plastic free, and I doubt it matters much.

Re:Maybe you should RTFA then.

[gnick]

But don't you know that every media outlet known to man (and a few that are unknown) will grab this headline and run with "Teh cancer causing plastic!!!!!!111!! News at 11:00."

You've got your terror-inducing tagline wrong - too informative and too specific on time. It's supposed to go:

A shocking new study has found that a chemical found in 99.8% of US househoulds may be killing your family. We'll have details on that alarming story sometime in the next 90 minutes. So stay tuned, we return you now to the live coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial.

This should be followed by 6 minutes of live coverage of a lawyer shuffling papers, a commercial break, and a return to the same teaser. Repeat ad nauseum.

Re:I haven't even rtfa, but here goes

[dgatwood]

Exactly. People who eat more prepackaged foods are more likely to be taking in all sorts of stuff---high fructose corn syrup, higher levels of sugar, higher levels of various preservatives (some of which break down into rather nasty stuff in the presence of citric acid), etc., all of which lead to increased levels of disease, whether it's heart disease, diabetes, cancer, etc. Those prepackaged foods are frequently packaged in containers made out of plastics that leach... yup, you guessed it... bisphenol A.

The correlation is interesting, but it isn't remotely close to proving causation. What would be required for that would be doing another study that compensates for dietary differences (and genetic predisposition and...).