WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 (UPI) -- Recycled thermal cash register receipts can spread bisphenol A, linked to certain harmful health effects, to other paper products, U.S. researchers say.
Researchers said bisphenol A, or BPA, has been found in 94 percent of thermal cash register receipts and the recycling of those receipts spreads BPA to paper napkins, toilet paper and other paper products, a release by the American Chemical Society said Wednesday.
Thermal receipts are coated with BPA that acts as a developer for the printing dye, they said.
Thermal cash register receipts and 14 other paper types from the United States, Japan, Korea and Vietnam were studied.
The only receipts that were BPA-free were from Japan, which phased out this particular use of BPA in 2001, researchers said.
Receipts put about 33.5 tons of BPA into the environment every year in the United State and Canada, the chemists group said.
Manufacturers produce more than 8 billion pounds of BPA worldwide every year for use in plastic water bottles, the lining of food cans and a variety of other products, including the thermal cash register receipts, researcher Kurunthachalam Kannan said.
