borosilicate glass: safe of endocrine disrupters? - Thyroid UK

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borosilicate glass: safe of endocrine disrupters?

Lilly12255 profile image
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Does anyone know if borosilicate glass is safe? Or is that an endocrine disrupter? Does it leach/ include harmful substances?

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Lilly12255 profile image
Lilly12255
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humanbean profile image
humanbean

I don't know the answer to your question, but I think jimh111 has an interest in endocrine disruptors and might know.

jimh111 profile image
jimh111

I don’t know anything about this glass but being glass I would guess it is safe. Glass is often used for safely encapsulating stuff.

We here a lot about endocrine disrupters but my view is we can ignore a lot of the information. If an endocrine disrupting chemical (EDC) has a short half life we can avoid it for a month or two and if we don’t get better we know it’s not the problem. Also, if an EDC affects the thyroid system in general it will push up TSH. So, if we don’t have an elevated TSH or it doesn’t fall when we take thyroid hormone we can also discount these EDCs.

I believe the problematic EDCs are those that affect peripheral tissues but not the pituitary, they produce hypothyroidism with normal thyroid blood tests. These are usually complex halogen based molecules that mimic thyroid hormone.

Also, bear in mind that it is complex molecules that mimic thyroid hormone that cause problems. These may be e. g. chlorine or bromine based but it is the molecules that cause the problem not the chlorine or bromine atoms. It’s specific molecules not substances that may happen to contain certain elements.

helvella profile image
helvellaAdministratorThyroid UK

Borosilicate glass is widely used (sometimes under the Pyrex branding) in laboratories for their glassware. If it were liable to be a significant source of leached substances, I think labs would have noticed long ago!

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