One of the circulating myths is that chocolate and coffee would be identified as EDCs and thus could become subject to a ban. However, a normal response to the endocrine system should be differentiated from an interference or disturbance to that system.
Eating chocolate triggers insulin production because of the glucose (sugar) content, but this cannot be regarded as endocrine disruption, because there is no interference or disturbance with normal hormone function in this case. Thus, chocolate is not an EDC.
In contrast, an EDC would be a chemical, or mixture of chemicals, that interferes with the ability of glucose to cause insulin release and/or the ability of insulin to interact with its receptor and/or the ability of insulin-receptor interaction to cause glucose uptake and/or utilization.
However, on the other hand, there are some valid concerns about the effects of coffee on the developing fetus and so pregnant women are usually already encouraged to limit their intake. For a related question on phytoestrogens please see this question.
This page is part of CHEM Trust’s Hormone Disrupting Chemicals FAQ – Full list of questions here.
The next question is “As people live much longer nowadays what is the evidence of the damaging effects due to hormone disrupters?“.
