Painted markings on the outside of popular Japanese glass baby bottle brand test positive for Lead, Arsenic, Cadmium & Mercury (newly purchased in 2022.)

Photos below are of the baby bottle tested and reported about in this post.
The photos include all of the packaging and shipping materials as well
(to address any doubt about the authenticity of the product.)

Another Lead Painted Baby Bottle:
Purchased on Amazon in February 2022

Published: March 3, 2022 – Thursday

Thank you thank you thank you thank you!

First I want to start this post off with a GIANT THANK YOU! Thank you to everyone who helped make the testing of this baby bottle possible (and all of the other testing of baby bottles that Lead Safe Mama, LLC has tested up to now, too!)

For those of you who are new here, it is important to understand that in order to keep this work truly independent (and without industry influence) the work of Lead Safe Mama, LLC is a collaborative community effort with our readers – readers all.over.the.world.

Readers tell us what products they would like to see tested, and readers help us cover the cost of the testing. Readers also help report our findings to the offending companies, and to the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission [the CPSC] and other regulatory agencies, when appropriate. You can read more about how it all works on this link.

Specifically regarding this glass Pigeon-brand baby bottle, here’s how things unfolded:

Last week (end-of-February, 2022) I published information about the Lansinoh glass bottles on Instagram (our findings from December, 2022 that the Lansinoh baby bottles are painted with Lead-containing paint — and that the company [Lansinoh] had contacted us asking us to remove our statements about their products from this website) and in those communications on social media I noted that in my research into the company, I had learned they were owned by the parent company, Pigeon (see graphic below). I was not at all familiar with Pigeon before that moment, and did not know that they also make a Pigeon-branded glass baby bottle (in addition to the glass Lansinoh bottles.)
A reader on Instagram then asked me if the Pigeon-branded glass bottles were also impacted by the same concerns that we were seeing with the Lansinoh bottles (because they were from the same company).
I then dug around on Amazon until I found the Pigeon store, and purchased a Pigeon-branded glass baby bottle to be delivered to me here at Lead Safe Mama, LLC HQ (aka: my house).
I then shared on the Interwebs that I had purchased the Pigeon glass bottle, and would be testing it (using XRF technology – read more about that here) soon (and reporting on those test results as soon as I have a moment) and I asked if folks could make contributions to help cover the cost of both purchasing and testing the bottle (which they did!)
That brings us to now…. and this post with the test results for the Pigeon glass baby bottle pictured (with red and yellow exterior painted decorative markings and measurement markings.)

Continue reading below the image.

Not only is this glass baby bottle by Pigeon (the parent company of Lansinoh) painted with Lead paint, but the paint also tested positive for three other poisons: high levels of both Cadmium (which causes cancer) and Arsenic and trace (low) levels of Mercury.

I may expound upon this later (I have’t yet had a chance to edit this post!), but I wanted to get this information out there for parents a.s.a.p. It’s frankly OUTRAGEOUS that not only is this Pigeon brand glass baby bottle painted with high-Lead paint (Lead content high enough to fit the definition of Lead-based paint [= over 5,000 ppm]… not the “less-offensive” moniker of “Lead-containing paint” [= under 5,000 ppm]) but the paint also tests positive for high levels of Cadmium (which causes cancer) in the red – and high levels of ARSENIC in the yellow. The red also tested positive for trace levels of MERCURY!

I am especially furious about this particular brand of baby bottle — because it is made by the parent company of Lansinoh (another brand of Lead-painted glass baby bottles). You can read my recent exchange with Lansinoh on this link here (and all Lansinoh-related posts here.)

Once I tested this glass baby bottle, the very first thing I did was look up the company (Pigeon — which I had never heard of before), and I saw that they had won an award (in Japan, in 2016) for their company’s business practices in creating products for new mothers. As soon as I saw they had won this award, I submitted a complaint to the organization that gave Pigeon the award (an organization with ties to a distinguished professor from Harvard), asking them to retract the award, given the company is guilty of painting their baby bottles – under two different brand names – with high-Lead paint.

Continue reading below the image.

Some additional links related to baby bottles.

This is NOT illegal!

Please note: Due to bizarre regulatory loopholes in relevant national and International legislation — even though Lead is known to be incredibly toxic, AND the scientific consensus is solid (across relevant disciplines) that there is no safe level of Lead exposure for children (and even though a recent 2017 scientific study identified and examined the concern for Lead in the exterior paint of glassware used for food use) IT IS NOT ILLEGAL to paint baby bottles with Lead paint in 2022, though it obviously should be — and we are trying to make this change through the awareness-promorion / advocacy efforts of Lead Safe Mama, LLC, and our volunteers around the world. Pigeon is the THIRD brand of Lead-painted baby bottles that the Lead Safe Mama team has identified in the past twelve months alone. In the years prior to that period, we also identified and reported on several other brands of Lead-painted baby feeding products (or Lead-containing baby feeding products). You can read the summary we submitted to the Consumer Product Safety Commission (in 2021) here.

Continue reading below the images.
The screenshots below are linked to the articles that they were taken from.

More outrage!!!

Just now as I was searching for more information about this award (to share on this post), I found the article linked above (first screenshot in the series of three above), which states that they (Pigeon) have saturated the Japanese market and are moving overseas as the Japanese birth rate has declined. DO THEY KNOW the link between LEAD EXPOSURE and infertility / declining birth rates? Have they considered that their products might be contributing to this “problem”. What ASSHOLES! [Read more about the link between Lead exposure and birth impacts here.]

XRF test results for the glass Pigeon-brand baby bottle pictured

Reading #1) On the red paint
60-second reading

Lead (Pb): 14,700 +/- 100 ppm
Cadmium (Cd): 856 +/- 14 ppm
Mercury (Hg): 33 +/- 9 ppm
Bromine (Br): non-detect
Chromium (Cr): 545 +/- 108 ppm
Zinc (Zn): 39 +/- 7 ppm
Selenium (Se): 522 +/- 14 ppm
Zirconium (Zr): 1,518 +/- 22 ppm

Reading #2) On the yellow paint
60-second reading

Lead (Pb): 8,306 +/- 82 ppm
Cadmium (Cd): non-detect
Mercury (Hg): non-detect
Bromine (Br): non-detect
Chromium (Cr): 191 +/- 57 ppm
Iron (Fe): 41 +/- 25 ppm
Nickel (Ni): 118 +/- 16 ppm
Arsenic (As): 952 +/- 41 ppm

Reading #3) On the clear glass of the bottle
30-second reading

Lead (Pb): non-detect
Cadmium (Cd): 14 +/- 3 ppm
Mercury (Hg): non-detect
Bromine (Br): non-detect
Chromium (Cr): 685 +/- 184 ppm
Zirconium (Zr): 1,416 +/- 26 ppm
Niobium (Nb): 322 +/- 13 ppm
Indium (In): 26 +/- 5 ppm

That’s it for now.
Thanks for being here.
Thanks for reading and sharing these posts.
I hope you are outraged with me.

Tamara Rubin
#LeadSafeMama
Owner – Lead Safe Mama, LLC

If you want to help support this work (Lead Safe Mama, LLC is the ONLY one doing this testing and reporting on this issue for some reason) please click here to see all of the ways you can support the work – many of which are 100% free to you but still make a big difference. Please click here to learn more about our unique community-collaborative small business model.

For those new to this website:

Tamara Rubin is a Federal-award-winning independent advocate for consumer goods safety and a documentary filmmaker. She is also a mother of Lead-poisoned children. Tamara’s sons were acutely Lead-poisoned in August of 2005. She began testing consumer goods for toxicants in 2009 and was the parent-advocate responsible for finding Lead in the popular fidget spinner toys in 2017. Tamara uses XRF testing (a scientific method used by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission) to test consumer goods for toxicants (specifically heavy metals), including Lead, Cadmium, Mercury, Antimony, and Arsenic. All test results reported on this website are science-based, accurate, and replicable. Items are tested multiple times, to confirm the test results for each component tested. Please click through to this link to learn more about the testing methodology used for the test results discussed and reported on this website.