plastics

i'm afraid of plastic and food. It's a known fact that polycarbonate plastic (#7), the type that some Nalgene water bottles are made out of, can leach BPA. And apparently, plastics #1-#6 all contain phthalates, used to soften the plastics and prevent them from cracking, but they also cause hormone imbalances.

Of course, the plastics industry claims that plastics are safe, and that plastics have not been proven to leech poisonous substances, or at least not at high enough concentrations for people to care. On the other hand, no one has proven that plastics are safe either. The USDA apparently recommends that you only use plastics for their intended purpose (e.g. no cooking in trash cans, no reusing single-use items), but i wonder if that's enough.

Plastic use in the co-ops is actually kind of frightening. Apparently it's standard practice to use old yogurt containers as cups, food storage, etc. And people like to run these through the sanitizer (high temperatures) and use them over and over.