Hmm. I'd be more curious about the mechanisms of how it's consumed and whether there's anything I could do to avoid it. Or changes in production that could be made to avoid it.
Since there were big headlines ~2010 about food in plastic heated in microwaves, I've switched to using glass containers for leftovers. Does that decrease the amount described in this article? Or is this some other mechanism of plastic consumption?
>Since there were big headlines ~2010 about food in plastic heated in microwaves, I've switched to using glass containers for leftovers. Does that decrease the amount described in this article?
AFAIK that's for BPA? I don't think microplastics are generated just by having the food being in contact with the plastic, so I doubt that makes a difference. If you read the study[1], it looks like most of the plastic comes from the drinking water, not through food.
One thing you can do is stop buying clothes with nylon and polyester (which is hard to find but not impossible) since these release plastic particles when you wash them which eventually enters the sea and the food chain.
While this makes sense to reduce plastic overall, it doesn’t help to eat less plastic right now.
Furthermore, I kinda think that this must be solved on a political level. It’s good if more and more people ask for plastic-free products, but don’t think that this changes anything on the individual level, especially if you consider that a lot of plastic in the oceans come from fishing nets.
It might actually make more sense to stop eating fish, if you want to have less plastic in your ocean.
So generelly: yes, try to reduce plastic, but also make it vocally (and vote) that this is important to you/all of us.
This is a big one. I have been making diligent efforts to buy everything cotton and wool I possibly can, and telling retailers why I want cotton and wool products. Wool is an especially good alternative for active wear given its natural anti-odor properties.
That last part is a big plus. Most of us are so used to cotton shirts and synthetics that pick up odors and need to have the funk washed out all the time. A wool shirt can be aired out overnight, given a quick shake and be completely odor-free the next morning.
I've worn merino wool underpants on trips where - for various reasons - I took barely anything except the clothes I wore. Hanging the underpants in the steamy bathroom while taking a shower will almost completely refresh them. Heck, even keeping them on in circumstances where showers weren't available didn't seem to pick up any odors, at least for a couple of days.
Not that I would normally recommend regularly wearing underwear for several days or even a week, but wool is clearly superior to cotton or synthetic fabrics.
And additionally these clothes feel much better on the skin, at least in my experience. It's also great to see how great wool e.g. repels water. Wool has so many great properties but it is of course also significantly more expensive.
The feel on your skin certainly depends on the type of wool used. I have some merino wool boxer briefs, which are utterly soft and comfortable. They're made from organic mulesing-free wool, which is what you should be looking for, if at all possible.
I also have some military surplus (Finnish M65) wool pants, which are made primarily for warmth and durability, not so much for soft comfort. Even after a sorely-needed rejuvenation with lanolin, they are still made from thick and somewhat coarse wool, which is obviously better for winter pants than silky soft merino.
Personally I don't find wool to be annoyingly scratchy. While I certainly do feel it a little bit when I put on a coarse wool flannel shirt before it warms to my body temperature, but it doesn't bother me. I know some people absolutely can't stand it, but I don't think anyone would have issues with good merino.
The smaller particles still get through. Microplastics really are micro. I would cite a URL but I learned this from a TV program in Europe called Xenius.
> I'd be more curious about the mechanisms of how it's consumed and whether there's anything I could do to avoid it.
Same
> Or changes in production that could be made to avoid it.
Not as interested in this, as its a moot point. Corporations that make things have my worst incentives as their goals, so if they found out, they might learn to make it even worse for me. God forbid the health care industry find out (I'm sure they have and we'll find out the effects decades down the road, similar to cigarettes).
Among other sources, microplastics are often used in toothpaste.
Quoted from Colgate's site [1]:
> Because microbeads aren't biodegradable, they pose a significant environmental concern. Research from the New York State Office of the Attorney General shows that microbeads can escape undetected into rivers and oceans after being washed down the drain, since their small size means they often aren't captured by regular sewage treatment systems. The report found that approximately 19 tons of microbeads are washed down New York drains each year!
> The beads can be mistaken as food by fish, birds and other wildlife. When animals fill their stomachs with microbeads, they may spread the plastic up the food chain. This can lead to contamination of the fish we eat, since microplastics soak up pollutants in waterways, according to the Australian Department of Environment and Energy. Once in the environment, microbeads are almost impossible to remove.
Is that also the case for BPA-free plastics? "Plastics" covers a wide range of chemicals, and I'm not up to date on the latest health information in this area.
be careful, the "BPA free" plastic products on the market might have just replaced BPA with BPS (or other plasticizers), which might be as bad as BPA when it comes to your health. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisphenol_S#Health_Effects
I'm using a wooden toothbrush handle with "BPA free" bristles and this potential switcheroo has me worried. Are there toothbrushes out there that avoid plastic entirely?
There is no strong evidence of any link between phytoestrogen consumption and adverse health effects, as shown by a cursory look at the Wikipedia page for phytoestrogens, and the literature.
I’ve consumed minimum 1 cup soy milk almost my entire life. No man boobs and my sperm works just fine.
What’s funny is people usually warn me that eating soy will somehow harm my masculinity, yet they aren’t aware milk, eggs, and meat also contain phytoestrogens https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/jf801344x
I am not making a two wrongs make a right argument. I argue that grains are pervasive in our society and have no noticable ill effects. You strawmanned by claiming soy has way higher phytoestrogens than other foods. It's not true. It is just more studied due to its increasing popularity. Lignan forms of phytoestrogens are in potent concentrations in common cereal grains.
> Phytoestrogens were detected in all foods analyzed; bread contained the highest amount of phytoestrogens-many as isoflavones-with an average content of 375 +/- 67 microg/100 g wet weight (excluding soya-linseed bread with 12,000 microg/100 g).
This is what I'm saying. You are comparing 375 and 12,000 and saying the difference doesn't matter. It's a two orders of magnitude difference.
So no, what you're saying is not true. Soy products have significantly higher levels of phytoestrogens than other foods.
As a general rule, one should be cautious about adding new substances into the human body, especially if you’re doing it accidentally and without prior planning or study.
These aren’t “new” substances. We have been using plastic for decades now and there isn’t clear knowledge that it is very bad to ingest. If it was super bad we would have seen the effects by now.
Look up the history of leaded gasoline sometime... There were studies asserting a certain 'natural' level of lead in the bloodstream which we now consider quite toxic. But everyone was poisoned together, due to ubiquity, so it took a massive effort to get people to understand that something was wrong.
If you change enough variables at once, it's pretty hard to get clear knowledge of harm. We're not out there running controlled experiments on every new substance, or collecting robust data. The rapid rise of unexplained autoimmune disease over the past few decades (one of quite a few negative health trends) indicates that our knowledge of what is harmful is incomplete.
Testosterone decline in men during that period (and yes, decades is a very short period of time in the context of health effects over time) would seem to corellate with phytoestrogen increase
Since there were big headlines ~2010 about food in plastic heated in microwaves, I've switched to using glass containers for leftovers. Does that decrease the amount described in this article? Or is this some other mechanism of plastic consumption?