{"id":609,"date":"2025-01-30T12:08:31","date_gmt":"2025-01-30T12:08:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/?p=307145"},"modified":"2025-01-30T12:08:31","modified_gmt":"2025-01-30T12:08:31","slug":"cloudy-with-a-chance-of-plastics-microplastics-are-everywhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo4.dedicatedhost247.com\/green\/green-news\/cloudy-with-a-chance-of-plastics-microplastics-are-everywhere\/","title":{"rendered":"Cloudy With A Chance of Plastics: Microplastics Are Everywhere"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Microplastics are everywhere.<\/p>\n

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Everyday items like clothing, food packaging, cosmetics, and car tires shed tiny particles of plastics, which in turn find their way into blood<\/a>, baby poop<\/a>, placentas<\/a>, and breastmilk<\/a>. According to recent research,<\/a> plastics are even in the intricate, delicate tissue that makes up our lungs.<\/p>\n

We breathe in about 16 bits of microplastic every hour, the equivalent of a credit card each week, according to a recent study published in the journal Physics of Fluids<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople never thought that we could inhale microplastic, so the data is underestimated and the result is more severe,\u201d says Saidul Islam<\/a>, lead author of the paper and professor at the University of Technology Sydney.<\/p>\n

Those plastics can get lodged into our airways and stay there over time, researchers say. Yet, despite its ubiquity in the environment and in our bodies, scientists don\u2019t fully understand the long-term impacts on our health.<\/p>\n

A 2019 report published in Environmental Science & Technology<\/em> found that people in the U.S. consume about 39,000<\/a> to 52,000 particles<\/a> of microplastics each year through food and water. That\u2019s the size of two giraffes in a year and the whole of the Eiffel Tower in a lifetime<\/a>. According to the United Nations Environmental Program, research on the more than 13,000 chemicals associated with plastics has found that at least 3,200 of those chemicals have been shown to be hazardous to human health. Lab experiments have shown that microplastics<\/a> can cause damage to human cells.<\/p>\n

Plastic producers, such as the British Plastics Federation, have pointed to international treaties that aim to \u201celiminate, restrict, reduce or eliminate\u201d persistent organic pollutants (POPs) from the environment to protect human health. In response to a recent Greenpeace report<\/a> on toxic chemicals found in plastics, BPF responded that tackling plastic pollution \u201cis essential but this cannot be done in isolation, without considering the impact of other key global environmental issues.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most studies tend to solely focus on the ingestion of microplastics, even though we are inhaling these plastics, too, Islam said. His study is among the first of its kind to quantify just how much we\u2019re breathing in.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow it is actually affecting our respiratory health is still unknown,\u201d says Islam. Air pollution particles are known to enter the body and cause millions of early deaths a year \u2014 it\u2019s just unclear how much of that is due to microplastics.<\/p>\n

Experts are starting to correlate microplastics with lung inflammation, shortness of breath and a higher risk of lung cancer. Research on rats suggests that when microplastics<\/a> infiltrate lung cells, they can start to jumble up cell composition. This suggests that exposure<\/a> to microplastics can cause lung injury in humans, too.<\/p>\n

Similar studies suggest that polypropylene plastics \u2014 rigid materials often found in disposable containers, automobile parts and even face masks used to prevent the spread of coronavirus \u2014 damage the mitochondria inside cells, which also causes lung inflammation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need more studies on how plastic embeds in the lung surface, how it act on the lung surface, how its toxicity increases over time and how it creates the diseases,\u201d Islam said, adding that his team plans to tackle these questions in the near future. \u201cWe\u2019re only starting to understand how it transports in the airways.\u201d<\/p>\n

Islam ran experiments on three different microplastics shapes (spherical, tetrahedral and cylindrical) and sizes (1.6, 2.56 and 5.56 microns). He found that shape, size and breathing patterns affected where the materials ended up.<\/p>\n

Study subjects performing vigorous physical activity, and breathing heavily, breathed in more plastics in volume than when resting. But slower breathing, associated with sleeping, was associated with smaller particles lodging deep inside the lungs.<\/p>\n

\u201cUsually, most of the larger microplastics deposit in the nasal cavities and trachea, because the nasal cavity acts as a filter,\u201d says Islam. \u201cWhen you\u2019re slow breathing, smaller particles are actually dropping in the deeper areas [of the respiratory system].\u201d Islam added that plastic nanoparticles can then move into different organs in the body.<\/p>\n

Research on microplastics and human health is still in its early days, said Mary Johnson, a principal research scientist at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. But one thing is clear: each stage of the life cycle of plastic disproportionately impacts<\/a> vulnerable communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn general, vulnerable populations are at even greater risk of the negative health impacts from the production, use and degradation of plastics,\u201d says Johnson. She cited a 2021 United Nations report on global plastics pollution that detailed Indigenous communities\u2019 displacement for oil extraction, contamination of water supplies in low-income communities, health problems among predominantly Black communities living near oil refineries in the South, among other dangers faced by at-risk communities. .<\/p>\n

Another study published earlier this year in Annals of Global Health found fossil-fuel workers, plastic producers and communities living near plastics production and disposal sites experienced higher rates of certain cancers, respiratory disease, and pregnancy and birth complications.<\/p>\n

Approximately 99% of plastic<\/a> comes from chemicals sourced from fossil fuels, and throughout their lifecycle, plastic production generates approximately 3.4%<\/a> of global greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n

Many known human carcinogens and endocrine disruptors, such as so-called forever chemicals<\/a>, are added to plastics during production to enhance performance. \u201cPlastics are highly toxic,\u201d says Islam. \u201cBecause when we are just inhaling the plastics, it\u2019s not only the plastic, it could also actually carry some more toxic chemicals.\u201d<\/p>\n

A longer version of this article is available at Discover Magazine. Nexus Media News is an editorially independent, nonprofit news service covering climate change. Follow us @NexusMediaNews.<\/p>\n

Republished from Nexus Media News<\/a>. <\/em>By <\/em>SOFIA QUAGLIA<\/em><\/p>\n

Related Story:<\/em><\/p>\n

Microplastics Are Literally Everywhere<\/h3>\n

It\u2019s getting harder and harder to avoid plastics.<\/p>\n

In a study published in Environmental Chemistry Letters<\/em> last month, scientists in Japan documented how they collected water from clouds at the top of both Mount Fuji and Mount Oyama to perform a first-of-its kind study on airborne microplastics in clouds. The team observed concentrations of microplastic between 6.7 and 13.9 pieces per liter of cloud water.<\/p>\n

In two separate studies out of St. Louis, Missouri, researchers found large amounts of microplastics in the water and sediment of a cave that has been closed to humans for decades.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the issue of \u2018plastic air pollution\u2019 is not addressed proactively, climate change and ecological risks may become a reality, causing irreversible and serious environmental damage<\/a> in the future,\u201d the lead author of the cloud study, Hiroshi Okochi of Waseda University, said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Sources (Clouds: Yale360<\/a>, Gizmodo, Al Jazeera, Futurism. Cave: STLPR<\/a>, Vice<\/a>, Futurism<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

Republished from Nexus Media News<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n

Photo by S\u00f6ren Funk<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

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