Scientists have warned that a chemical, called bisphenol A, commonly found in food-packaging may rob a man of his sex appeal.
Bisphenol A, or BPA, which is used to harden plastics, is one of the world’s most widely manufactured chemicals found in dozens of daily items including baby bottles, CD cases and food and drink-packaging. Because the chemical mimics oestrogen, it’s believed it interferes with the way hormones are processed by the body.
Now, a new study by the University of Missouri in the US has found that male mice who were exposed to bisphenol A as babies became demasculanised and “behaved more like females”, the Daily Mail reported.
Lead author Prof. Cheryl Rosenfeld said the chemical had suppressed the early production of testosterone, which the females could sense.
“The BPA-exposed deer mice in our study look normal; there is nothing obviously wrong with them. Yet, they are clearly different. Females don’t want to mate with BPA-exposed male deer mice, and BPA-exposed males perform worse on spatial navigation tasks that assess their ability to find female partners in the wild,” she said.
The research could have implications on how BPA affects human development and behaviour, say the scientists. “These findings presumably have broad implications to other species, including humans, where there are also innate differences between males and females in cognitive and behavioural patterns.
“Whether there are comparable health threats to humans remains unclear, but there clearly must be a concern,” Rosenfeld said.