Like the better-known chemical BPA, BPS is an endocrine disruptor linked to breast cancer and reproductive toxicity.
From a Kirkland, Washington, USA health hazards sheet that I found in a quick search:
TIPS TO REDUCE EXPOSURES TO BISPHENOLS IN RECEIPTS:
- DO NOT compost or recycle receipts and other thermal paper. BPA & BPS residues from receipts will contaminate recycled paper.
- Minimize receipt collection by declining receipts at gas pumps, ATMs and other machines when possible.
- Never give a child a receipt to hold or play with.
- After handling a receipt, wash hands before preparing and eating food.
- Do not use alcohol-based hand cleaners after handling receipts. A recent study showed that these products can increase the skin’s BPA absorption.
- Take advantage of store services that email or archive paperless purchase records.
- Store receipts separately in an envelope in a wallet or purse.
HAZARDS FOUND IN LABORATORY TESTS INCLUDE:
- Obesity
- Diabetes
- Early Puberty
- Cardiovascular system disorders
- Abnormal reproductive system development
- Hormone abnormalities in children
- Susceptibility to various cancers
- Resistance to chemotherapy
- Diminished intellectual capacity
Hand sanitizer makes thermal receipts “erasable”.
Lovely to recall how I used to have fun doing this, smearing my fingers all over alcohol soaked receipts to maximize my absorption of BPA.
So THAT’S why I’m fat and have a small dick!
Above that it mentions:
HAZARDS FOUND IN LABORATORY TESTS INCLUDE:
- Obesity
- Diabetes
- Early Puberty
- Cardiovascular system disorders
- Abnormal reproductive system development
- Hormone abnormalities in children
- Susceptibility to various cancers
- Resistance to chemotherapy
- Diminished intellectual capacity
Great, so receipts are going to be like our version of the leaded gasoline and mercury of past generations? 🫠
It’s plastics in general, but yeah. It’s already in your brain, and you’re accumulating more every year.
As I understand it, plastics themselves have no known negative impact on human health - it’s the additives in the plastics that are a problem. But I don’t think the BPA hazards listed above can be fairly generalized to all microplastics.
EDIT:
from the hazards sheet:
HEALTH HAZARDS IN THERMAL PAPER WITH BISPHENOLS (BPA & BPS)
So BPA and BPS, and they’re talking about thermal paper with those in particular.
I guess this has more details about BPA hazards: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_Bisphenol_A
The U.S. FDA states “BPA is safe at the current levels occurring in foods” based on extensive research, including two more studies issued by the agency in early 2014.[2] The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) reviewed new scientific information on BPA in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2015: EFSA’s experts concluded on each occasion that they could not identify any new evidence which would lead them to revise their opinion that the known level of exposure to BPA is safe; however, the EFSA does recognize some uncertainties, and will continue to investigate them.
As usual, it’s highly contextual when something is a hazard and to what extent it is.
Scientists also used to not think plastics crossed the blood-brain barrier until they started finding it in cadaver brains, you know? The list of things we understand about how plastics react to the body and its chemical processes is probably a much shorter list than the one of things we don’t understand about plastics.
Yup, though this isn’t an argument for why plastics are certainly dangerous. It doesn’t really matter, there are many reasons plastics are a problem, even if we don’t have that smoking gun yet on how actual plastic is hazardous. BPA, BPS, PVC, and other additives are already horrible, the reliance on plastics are part of what is destroying the earth’s climate, and these materials are not recyclable or re-usable, it’s an environmental disaster on a scale we have never seen, etc.
As I understand it, plastics themselves have no known negative impact on human health - it’s the additives in the plastics that are a problem.
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What are these additive-free plastics you’re suggesting exist? Should we make sure the microplastics lodged in our brain are only of the free-range, organic, and crafted with love variety?
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There have already been preliminary studies linking higher concentrations of microplastics with poor medical outcomes with more damning reports coming out very frequently. In the meantime, maybe let’s not pretend that whatever absence of evidence you perceive is evidence of absence.
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Having no known negative impact certainly doesn’t mean they have a known positive impact. So it’s likely good to try to avoid them as much as you can.
I know it sucks because it’s yet another tough to impossible problem to tackle alongside everything else, but that’s just a Monday.
yeah, this is probably a bit like when people thought smoking wasn’t bad for you.
The higher concentration of microplastics are correlation studies, they don’t establish a causal link (which would be huge news and the discovery of a century). For example, the correlation could just be due to the poorer lifestyles of those who consume more microplastics (for example, they’re more common in processed and fast foods, which tend to be less healthy, for example and may also just be more common in people with lower economic status who then have less access to healthcare and more likely to die younger for a variety of reasons). The point is that they don’t have the smoking gun, yet.
We should just be clear about where we are at with the evidence, I’m not saying we shouldn’t be concerned or the lack of evidence is somehow exonerating or that we should be confident this isn’t a public health concern - I am very much concerned.
And of course there are lots of other reasons to avoid plastics, including its impact on the ecology and agriculture. It’s terrifying that China for example will just till plastic sheeting into the soil rather than bother to pull it up (and perhaps concerning plastic sheeting is used as a mulch in the first place, both in China and other countries like the U.S.).
I don’t know what to tell you about additives, they absolutely do make plastics without some of the known-to-be-hazardous additives, though I’m not saying that has in any way been adopted across the board or has solved the problem (I don’t know enough about that to be honest, but I’m cynical industrialists are going to give a shit).
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and i thought the prices were making me dizzy
Nice try big data. U aren’t getting my email that easily!
This_is_another_fake_email@mailinator.com
add a number to the end if it says it’s already been used and won’t let you use it again.
Propaganda works
Holding a receipt for 10 seconds? Damn. And is there any tell for BPS-reduced or BPS free receipt paper?
I have receipts all over my place, though I organized them all recently. But now I know to handle them with gloves on next time.
The problem is with receipts on thermal paper, not those printed with normal ink, so [edit:
manysome] receipts are not an issueany more.If you want to tell the difference, you could try applying heat (like a hair dryer or iron) over the receipts and see which ones change color (usually turning grey or black where heated).
Once you find a few, you’ll likely get a feel for which ones are likely to be thermal paper just by looking and you can practice extra care with those. (Tip: they are usually the ones that appear a bit glossy.)
I haven’t seen a receipt printed with normal ink in decades. They’re all thermal now.
The problem is with receipts on thermal paper, not those printed with normal ink, so many receipts are not an issue any more.
Um, you’ve got it backwards, most receipts are now thermally printed. The ink printed receipts are the “outdated” ones.
reason being: thermal receipt printers have higher uptime with lower maintenance costs, they print faster, and use no consumable other than the paper.
at my office we don’t print many receipts, but we use plain paper (letter, half letter or photo paper sized–as appropriate) loaded into a normal inkjet printer that uses cheap (~ $2 ea) knockoff ink cartridges that get recycled (we hope, anyway, when we drop them off at a collection point).
Most receipts use thermal paper that i’ve seen. You can rub one with a coin quickly and that brings up marks on many.
My question is that is it all thermal paper is problematic or some but there’s no telling the difference except to avoid all of that type?
If your bullshit detectors are going off on this one, you’re not alone. Can we please quantify the risk?
Uh fuckin how
How do you do studies that require generations of actual people? That are then peer-reviewed?
How are you “quantifying risk”
Math. The answer is math.
Eww
Yeah they’re using it. In labs. Where they study things.
You don’t get to just model reality, you have to study it
Sure. There’s quantitiative information in the article, and more if you click the links.
You’re always welcome to read the article - I find that they often include additional information related to the headline!
Since you were the slightly snarkier of the two responses, can you point out where in the article it quantities the risk? Not the concentration vs limits. If it’s discussed in the links, just tell me which link to follow. No need to show where.
I would normally follow the links to the primary peer-reviewed journal article, but there isn’t one.
Click the links in the article and follow back to the source my guy. It’s not hard and I don’t understand why you expect these people to prove your claim wrong, you should be the one to substantiate it and to do that you might start following some of the links and reading the source material for it.
It’s pretty obvious that quantitative risk data were not provided in the articles or links. The study doesn’t claim to produce such data.
I’m not even convinced you would know such data if you saw it, but you’re quite confident that if one digs hard enough, one will find it.
This is a real 1950s, we’ve sprayed things with carcinogens and poison type problem that there needs to be regulation on. The problem is that usually comes from a lawsuit.
Oh that’s cool, not like my job requires me to constantly handle reciepts or anything smh
Can you wear gloves?
Maybe, i’ll have to ask
If they say no call OSHA and say your employer is denying you the right to PPE.
They should first verify that they use these kind of printers, I guess.
Show them this article, lawsuits aren’t cheap.
Where are all the CVS receipt references?
Now if I get some weird cancer one day I’ll probably link it to that one joint I hit that was rolled in thermal paper :/
This the second person saying this. What’s up with you guys?
I mean I’ve been in a situation with no rizla myself but I’ve just used the remains of a cigarette after removing the tobacco.
That’s so much grosser and arguably just as carcinogenic.
I mean a not used cigarette and emptying out the tobacco and using the paper from that.
I doubt that is more carcinogenic than thermal paper coated in BPA.
The cancer you get from cigs is the tobacco.
I remember hearing about basically this literally a decade ago. Nothing’s been done about it since then. Nothing will be done about it now. Not unless we make a fuss about it at which point they’ll pretend to give a shit about us and make grand gestures towards transitioning away from receipts made from hazardous materials. Meanwhile, they’ll continue to knowingly expose us to some other hazardous material for the next decade until some independent research team uncovers how it’s slowly poisoning everybody who comes into contact with it. And thus the cycle continues.
Under capitalism, there is no incentive to do anything for the benefit of humankind when it comes into conflict with the ultimate goal of accumulating as much wealth for yourself as humanly possible. It will always corrupt.
“Oh, you don’t need to get a receipt if you give us your email address instead…”
I just don’t imagine a scenario where I’d need to prove I bought a donut.
This is untrue, your confusing capitalism and short sighted greed. Capitalism’s major issue is that very often the ship is being steered by somebody chasing next quarter’s profits and abandoning anything further into the future.
Henry Ford famously paid his workers $5 a day in 1914 primarily to reduce high labor turnover and improve worker productivity. This wage increase was a significant shift from the previous average rate of $2.34, and it was also intended to make the Model T more affordable for his own workers. Here’s a more detailed look at the reasons behind Ford’s $5-a-day wage: Reduced Turnover: Ford had a crippling labor turnover rate of 370%. By offering a higher wage, he aimed to attract and retain workers, minimizing the cost and disruption of constantly hiring and training new employees. Increased Productivity: Ford believed that paying workers a higher wage would motivate them to work harder and more efficiently. Improved Morale: The higher wage was intended to improve workers’ morale and reduce the distractions caused by financial worries. Making Cars Affordable: A key factor was the desire to make the Model T affordable for the workers who were producing it. By making their wages high enough to purchase a car, Ford hoped to stimulate demand and create a larger market for his product. “Profit-Sharing” and “Fordism”: Ford initially presented the wage increase as a “profit-sharing” plan, arguing that workers deserved a greater share of the company’s success. This concept became known as “Fordism,” which combined large-scale production with higher wages.
The only positive example of capitalism you could find is over 100 years old.
And they chose Henry Ford of all people, the man responsible for the modern assembly line (capitalist alienation at its most extreme) and an actual Nazi.
Fun fact: he also founded two towns to house his workers, but segregated them by whites / non. The towns are still around today, and called Dearborn and Inkster. I’ll let you guess which were for which. 🤢🖕🏽
Imagine defending capitalism in the Year of Our Lord 2025
Imagine not understanding the system you hate isn’t capitalism but cronyism and protectionism in the year of our Lord 2025. The government shouldn’t subsidize business and let megacorps not pay tax while also giving them endless subsidies in return for political favor. If your company can’t compete it should fail.
Breathe
I think you’re forgetting the part where the Dodge brothers sued Ford for this and the courts ruled in favor of the brothers Dodge. Saying that companies must act in the sole benefit of their shareholders.
Do you have a citation for that? Honest question as I hadn’t heard this before. Until this point I have always heard that corporations have no legal duty to put shareholder profits over all other considerations. Before anyone wonders, I’m not trying to defend capitalism, which I think is indefensible.
Lol the citation is literally Dodge v. Ford Motor Co.
Oh, good thing we only have the Doge idjits then… 😐
your confusing capitalism and short sighted greed.
In theory those may be different. In practice they often aren’t. That’s the problem. That’s why it needs rails.
Nothing’s been done about it since then.
Research has gone into safer replacements. Many companies have been switching to BPA-free formulas, most notably CVS (notorious for sheer area of thermal paper receipts) that went BPA/BPS free in 2019. Some governments have banned BPA thermal paper, and others, including the EU, have set limits. BPA has been getting phased out because of these studies.
Nothing will be done about it now.
Well no, this organization is lining up to try to replicate the success with getting BPA out of thermal paper by trying to get BPS replaced, too.
Here’s a study of Switzerland. Between 2014 and 2019, the incidence of BPA thermal paper went from 81% down to around 50%, and then after the ban it went to around 10%. BPS has seen some backsliding, and has increased from 3.1% to 19.1%. Still, that’s a significant reduction in the past decade of papers that use either BPA or BPS.
People are doing the work. There’s no reason to sit around and do nothing and complain that others are doing nothing, too.
Thanks for fact-checking me, it’s good to know that there are pockets of the world that are trying to do the right thing. And sorry for my pessimism, I live in America.
Banned in Germany since 2020; 2025 banned across Europe. So not a capitalism problem per se, more like an government problem
Who lobbies the government?
not a capitalism problem per se, more like an government problem
That’s like saying “bleeding is not a stabbing problem per se, more like a bandages problem”
Like, yeah, keeping a stockpile of bandages is probably a good idea just in case, but maybe we should prevent people from stabbing each other in the first place?
Looked it up, could only find bans of BPA, which has since been replaced with BPS. Can you confirm BPS is actually banned?
https://www.packaginglaw.com/news/eu-bans-bpa-and-other-bisphenols-food-contact-materials
But you right, I mixed up BPA/BPS buz in the link its mentioned that EU also banned BPS
„The revised regulation adopted in December applies the restrictions to BPS and other hazardous bisphenols and bisphenol derivatives […]“
Ooh, ooh! We’ve got those in spades! Pick us! Pick us! Pick US!
The governments you’re referring to are socially funded institutions that exist to protect the populace against the exploitations of capitalism. Sadly, they are the exception to many other governments which have let the corruption that capitalism breeds take hold.
So corruption isn’t a government problem?
Gee wiz, does nothing we come in contact with poison us at this point? Good luck getting the Chud Administration to do anything. They would probably tell them to add more poison.
Mean while doctors can’t figure out why cancer rates are spiking
I thought BPA and derivatives such as BPS were banned at the federal level. I remember hearing these claims back in 2010. There was a whole campaign with plastic bottles and “BPA-free” marketing.
Yet it’s still used today? Absolutely insane.
I used to always hold the receipt in my mouth as I put my card away. Glad I kicked that habit. Still did it for decades though.
Say receipts are toxic.
People need receipts to return items.
Profit!
I always get my receipts emailed so I don’t have to keep track of them and I can just search my email for them.
They fade away after a day regardless.
Retail workers getting fucked again
Food service workers as well.
