The six largest manufacturers of baby bottles have agreed to stop selling bottles in the United States that are made with bisphenol A, a chemical widely used in plastics, linked to a variety of health problems.

They made this decision after Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, joined by the attorneys general in Connecticut, Delaware and New Jersey wrote to 11 bottle manufacturers last October to ask them to voluntarily stop using the controversial chemical.

"The evidence seems too clear and emphatic and unequivocal to say we should simply permit this stuff to go into children on a massive scale," Blumenthal said yesterday. "And there's no reason for it, because there are substitutes available."

Blumenthal said he is working at gathering support from other attorneys general to demand that manufacturers take BPA out of infant formula cans and all food and beverage containers.

According to Blumenthal Avent, Disney First Years, Gerber, Dr. Brown, Playtex and Evenflow have agreed to the request. He added that the companies stopped manufacturing bottles with BPA a couple of weeks ago.

The chemical in question Bisphenol A, commonly called BPA, has been used commercially since the 1950s in a variety of everyday items including plastic beverage containers, eyeglasses and compact discs. The chemical is said to mimic the hormone estrogen and may disrupt the body's endocrine system and fetuses, infants and children are especially susceptible as BPA can interfere with cell function at a point when their bodies are still developing.

The FDA has maintained that BPA is safe despite more than 130 studies over the past decade linking the chemical to breast cancer, obesity and other disorders. A recent study of BPA in humans found adults with higher levels of bisphenol A had elevated rates of heart disease, diabetes and liver abnormalities, while a study by researchers at the Yale School of Medicine linked BPA to problems with brain function and mood disorders in monkeys last year.

The FDA was faulted by its own panel of independent science advisers, who said the FDA's position on BPA was scientifically flawed and the agency is revisiting its position on the chemical. According to the National Toxicology Program, part of the National Institutes of Health, there is "some concern" BPA may affect the brain and behavioral development of fetuses, infants and young children.

The American Chemistry Council, an industry group that represents companies that make BPA, yesterday repeated the FDA's position that BPA is safe at current levels in food bottles and containers.

Bottle manufacturers are however opting to keep the chemical out. Shannon Jenest of Philips Avent, which is number one in U. S. dollar sales of baby bottles said, "We made a business decision to move out of BPA."

The company Philips Avent, stopped selling baby products containing BPA on December 31 in North America although they still market them abroad. "We felt like we had hit a tipping point with our consumers and with our retailers," Jenest said. "Babies R Us was banning it, Target was going to, CVS was going to, and so the distribution channels were lessening and lessening."

On Wednesday, lawmakers in Suffolk County, N. Y., became the first in the nation to vote on a ban on baby bottles and toddler sippy cups made with BPA.

Richard Wiles, executive director of the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy organization said, "Today's deal underscores the need for the Congress and the Obama administration to overhaul federal chemicals policy to protect infants and children from exposures to toxic chemicals," Wiles said. "When the public is forced to rely on state actions to achieve nationwide protections, we know the federal system is broken."