A University of Ulster scientist has warned that parents should avoid using plastic baby bottles containing a potentially cancer-causing chemical.

The chemical, known as BPA, has recently been banned in Canada because of concerns over the dangers it could pose to infants.

However, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) said that a review by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) last summer had concluded that there was no risk to infants from the quantities of BPA that could leach from bottles.

This was because humans including newborns eliminated it quickly from their bodies.

Professor Vyvyan Howard, a toxico-pathologist at the University of Ulster's Biomedical Sciences Research Institute said we should not be exposing infants to possible cancer risks from Bisphenol A (BPA) as toxicological evidence showed foetuses and young babies were most at risk from the hormonal damage it had been shown to cause to animals.

Up to half a million baby bottles are sold each year in Ireland, and most still contain BPA although alternatives are slowly becoming available.

But Prof Howard who is also president of the Society of Doctors for the Environment said that his research, and that of others, showed that BPA had endocrine-disrupting effects at very low doses, although toxicological techniques were not yet sophisticated enough to prove this definitively.

Developing

Only last year the Canadian authorities had listed BPA as a toxic substance and banned the use of polycarbonate plastic baby bottles which contained it, he said.

"Given that the first few months out of the womb are crucial while babies are still developing their brains and reproductive organs, it would be recommended that Irish parents certainly err on the side of caution and seek to purchase BPA-free products for infants and children," he said.

Prof Howard said that for that reason he had "voted with my feet" by choosing to use only glass bottles with his own child, who was now three years old.

His views have been quoted by the company Pharmed which has launched two types of BPA-free bottles on the Irish market, Bibi and Born Free, but Prof Howard stressed that he had "absolutely no financial or any other connection" to them.

He said BPA had a whole raft of effects on the foetus, and research by his colleague Professor Ana Soto at Tufts University showed BPA had effects on breast, prostate and testicular development even at doses much lower than those permitted under current guidelines.

The Canadian authorities concluded that the main source of exposure to BPA for babies was from the use of baby bottles exposed to high temperatures and from cans of infant formula, and though exposure was below levels that caused effects, uncertainty in some studies about the potential effects of even low levels had led to them taking action to protect infants and young children.

But FSAI deputy chief executive Alan Reilly said that EFSA had evaluated the Canadian opinion on BPA and still concluded it was safe.

"All of the risks have been assessed and they have come to the conclusion that there is no danger, even for newborns at the levels they are exposed to it," he said.

While mothers could choose to use BPA-free bottles if they wished, the FSAI would not advise them against using those made with BPA.

Market leader Philips Avent said their BPA-free bottles were available online and they would make them available in Irish stores if consumers demanded them.