Don't Just Get Mad, Testify!

When Seattle mom Katalin Marky found out she had unknowingly exposed her child to bisphenol A, she didn’t just get mad, she went to Olympia to testify in favor of The Safe Baby Bottle Act. Here’s her story she shared with legislators:

When I was pregnant I was encouraged to drink a lot of water. I regularly drank water from my polycarbonate water bottle. I thought I was doing a good thing. I found out later that I had unknowingly exposed my child to bisphenol A (BPA) each time I took a sip.

After my daughter was born, she was fed baby formula from a plastic baby bottle, which contained BPA. Initially, I prepared my daughter’s formula by boiling the water to sterilize it and then pouring it into the bottle. After it cooled, I added baby formula. Today I know that I should have never poured hot water into the baby bottle, because the hotter the liquid, the more BPA is likely released. I finally stopped using the bottle when my daughter was 7 months old – that’s when I first heard about the dangers associated with BPA. But I could not undo the exposures that my daughter had already experienced during my pregnancy and later during her first months of life.

When I first heard about BPA, I was angry. I felt betrayed and misled. Products I had assumed to be safe were actually putting my daughter’s health at risk. I know I am not alone feeling this way and there are many other parents with a similar experience.

I came to Olympia to ask you to pass the strongest version of The Safe Baby Bottle Act, including sports water bottles, to protect all Washington families and children from BPA.

Being a new parent is challenging enough. We shouldn’t need to worry about toxic chemicals in products and shouldn’t need to be experts on BPA or any other chemical when we go shopping for our children.

Katalin testified before the House Environmental Health Committee on February 17, 2010. You can listen to her testimony here (her testimony starts at 37th minute). She also delivered pictures of Washington mothers and children who support banning BPA, but could not attend the hearing. You can see some of those pictures on our Facebook Page.