BPA Causes 'Man Problems'

BPA linked to male sexual dysfunction in Chinese workers

As if you needed any new reasons to toss out your old, BPA water bottles: A new study out of China links the chemical to sexual dysfunction in males. (That gigantic clinking noise you hear is the sound of millions of male, "my-old-Nalgene-is-fine" users collectively tossing their bottles in the trash.)

Researchers studied 550 factory workers in China who were exposed to 50 times more BPA than the average person and found that the factory workers were four times more likely to complain of problems with erectile dysfunction than coworkers not exposed to BPA. 15.5 percent of BPA-exposed workers reported of erectile dysfunction more than half of the time, compared with 4.4 percent of men not exposed to BPA.

Even the researchers warned that the studies are too preliminary to conclude anything definitive:

"The study certainly provides the human evidence to confirm animal studies, but one study is not going to answer any questions," said Dr. De-kun Li, the study's lead author and a reproductive and perinatal epidemiologist at Kaiser Permanente's Division of Research in Oakland, Calif.

"At this point ... we don't know the safety of the lower level," he said, but noted that people do not need to worry too much. "We don't have to be alarmed and go crazy."

Trust me, doctor—there's no way to even hint to a bunch of dudes that old water bottles might make Mr. Happy stop working without causing crazy alarm. Between that and telling women it'll mess with their babies, I think we can all count BPA as officially dead. Government regulations or not, the market will certainly see to that.

—Ted Alvarez

BPA linked to sexual dysfunction in males (ABC)