| Health / Health News |
Purchase receipts with easily erasable ink contain cancer- and infertility inducing substances
90 percent of purchase tickets and receipts, those whose ink is erased after some time because they are made of ‘thermal paper’, contain bisphenol A (BPA), a well‑known endocrine disruptor that alters hormonal balance in people exposed to it, and it leads to hormonal diseases such as genitourinary malformations, infertility, obesity and cancer in hormone‑dependent organs (such as breast cancer).
Purchase receipts with easily erasable ink contain cancer- and infertility inducing substances. I
Currently, there is great concern about the unnoticed exposure of general population to bisphenol A. The industry has sought alternatives for gradually replacing BPA in most of its applications, as is the case of the thermal paper used in tickets and receipts.
“We can recognize this kind of paper because it instantly turns black if we put it close to a heat source like, for example, a match,” the lead authors of this study Nicolás Olea, professor of Medicine at the University of Granada (UGR), and José Manuel Molina from the ibs. Granada, explain.
One of the alternatives is the use of bisphenol S (BPS), which has a molecular structure similar to that of BPA but introducing a sulfur atom (S) instead of a carbon atom (C) in its formula.
The researchers analyze the presence of BPA and BPS in the thermal paper receipts we use on a daily basis, as well as the hormone‑like activities of those receipts.
Thermal paper receipts are easily identified by the customer since they are those receipts that, after some time, lose what they have printed on them and, when you are going to return the trousers you bought, the cashiers tell you that they cannot see anything.
Very often, the only thing you find is a fine white powder that comes off when taking them out of the handbag or purse. BPA is, precisely, that white powder that sticks to your fingers.
More than 90% of the receipts collected in Brazil and Spain had BPA and presented hormone‑like, anti‑androgenic activity.
However, only half of the receipts collected in France presented BPA, which confirms that the French Government took action to the reduction of the use of that chemical compound in thermal paper since 2014, with the aim of protecting the population.
“What’s bad about the French alternative is that it seems to use BPS, since we have found it mostly in samples from that country and seldom have we found it in Brazilian or Spanish samples. Unfortunately, BPS is also an endocrine disruptor, and its environmental persistence is greater than that of BPA, so it’s not a valid option”.
Still, the researchers fear an increase in its use in years to come, since its regulation is not as strict as that of BPA.
The researchers recommend the population to proceed with caution.
“For example, tickets should not get in contact with food –for instance, meat or fish– while unpacking it in the kitchen. Moreover, we should not crumple the tickets to throw them in the trash, play with them, write notes on them, or store them in cars, purses or handbags. In short, we should manipulate this kind of tickets as little as possible.” (University of Granada)
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