Micro nutrients, micro plastics

When I first started hearing about "micro plastics" contaminating our water (etc), I figured the micro plastics were microscopic in size.  Makes sense, right?  

But a "micro plastic" is just anything smaller than 5 mm, and 5 mm is definitely visible.  It's about the width of the push button on a plastic pen. 

The push button is 5 mm across:
micro plastic in the making.

What I was thinking of --- those too-tiny-to-see pieces of plastic --- also have a name; they're called nanoplastics, and scientists find those in all sorts of unwanted places, including our bodies.   "Nanoplastics can easily cross all kinds of barriers , whether it's the blood-brain barrier or the placental barrier, and get into our tissues," says the former director of an agency that ought to know:  the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the National Toxicology Program.  

How these plastics get into our bodies in the first place, though, is that we eat, drink, and breathe them, partly in the form of microplastics.  At least, that's what a recent Consumer Reports article says.  And how much plastic do we eat?  Maybe as much as 5 mg per week:  a credit card worth of plastic (or half a ballpoint pen). 

Cracking open a brand new plastic bottle or tearing a wrapper off a sandwich releases fragments of plastic that we might end up ingesting.   Household dust can be full of microplastics -- and it's possible that you might kick this up into the air from your carpet and breathe it in.  Plastic fibers even wash off clothes into our water supplies.

What's so bad about eating plastic?  

• "Nanoplastic particles  might create a systemic inflammatory response."
• "Nanoplastics could possibly release harmful chemicals (such as BPA) into our bodies."
  
• "Microplastics act like magnets for additional toxins, picking up pollutants such as PCBs, chemicals now banned for manufacture in the U.S., but still present in the environment."
• "Chemicals used in plastic containers affect brain and organ development in children, and are linked to infertility and cardiovascular problems."

And the truth is we don't know the full effect of plastic.  Part of the reason we're in the dark is the fact that plastic is still relatively new.  As CR writes, "Half of the plastic ever made was made in just the last 13 years".   Plastic feels like it's been around forEVER, but I myself grew up with a childhood of glass bottles and cardboard cartons for everything -- baby oil came in glass bottles; soda came in glass bottles; milk came in paper cartons.   I still remember seeing the add for the brand new invention of the 2-liter soda bottle, and being horrified as the happy family accidentally brushed it off the table onto the floor.  Seeing the bottle bounce instead of shatter was stunning -- I still remember the shocked surprise I felt -- it was exactly the memorable sensation that the ad writers intended, one I still remember decades later.  

The other part of the reason we don't know the full effect of plastic on our health is that "our risk assessment methods haven't been updated since the late 1950's.  It measures the dangers of high doses of a chemical but doesn't account for the fact that low doses may have different harmful effects."

We CAN reduce the amount of plastic we ingest (even if we can't completely eliminate it).  Consumer Reports suggests these six steps to take:

1. Drink tap water instead of bottled water.  
2. Use the stove to heat food, or microwave it in glass instead of plastic.  (Heated plastics leach yucky stuff into food).
3. Buy and store food in glass, silicone, or foil instead of in plastic.  (I'll write about silcone on Wednesday!!!)
4. Eat fresh food as much as possible.  ("The more processed or packaged a food is, the higher a risk that it contains worrisome chemicals.  Food cans are often lined with bisphenol A (or similar compounds . . ." )
5. Vacuum regularly; don't allow household surfaces to get dusty.  ("Cleaning up dust may help reduce the amount of plastics you inhale, especially if you are stuck inside for a long time . . . ")
6. Work with your community.  ("Seek out groups such as Upstream.org, a nonprofit working to create reusable takeout packaging for restaurants")

To this I'll add:  refuse plastic wherever possible.  We each have our own limit for what "possible" means, but every little piece of plastic we do NOT bring into this world is one less piece of plastic that we're in danger of eating or breathing . . .  or that my grandchildren's grandchildren will be in danger of eating or breathing.  It's Nanas against nanoplastics in this household, and I'm rooting for the Nanas to win.