Canadian retailers yank BPA products

16 April 2008 22:23  [Source: ICIS news]

HOUSTON (ICIS news)--Retail giant Wal-Mart’s Canadian subsidiaries will remove all products containing bisphenol A (BPA) from their shelves due to health concerns surrounding the chemical, the company said on Wednesday.

The move will affect Wal-Mart’s 280 Zellers stores and the 94 stores in its Hudson Bay Company department store chain. Hudson Bay president and CEO Robert Johnson said the company made the decision after hearing that the Canadian government may classify BPA as a dangerous substance.

“We take product safety issues very seriously,” Johnson said in a statement. “We are taking immediate action to remove the product and offer only BPA-free baby products in our stores.”

BPA is contained in polycarbonate, a hard plastic used for food and beverage containers among many other things. Regulators in the US and Canada have recently renewed demands for more scrutiny on the health effects of the chemical, which mimics the hormone estrogen and has been linked to cancer, diabetes and reproductive defects in some studies.

The Forzani Group, the largest sporting goods retailer in Canada, said on Tuesday that it would also pull all water bottles containing BPA from its shelves.

For more on BPA and PC, visit ICIS Chemical Intelligence

By: Ben Lefebvre
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