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New study finds microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, alter behaviour
(www.sustainableplastics.com)
this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2023
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I often see articles about the effects of microplastics, but I have yet to see or read about the best steps we can take to combat them.
Can anyone recommend some content that describes ways to reduce exposure or share the most effective ways there are of reducing microplastic exposure?
Don't heat food in plastic in the microwave. Put in the effort to put it in glass or a plate or so, then heat.
Don't store hot leftovers in plastic.
Don't buy and drink plastic bottled water.
If you can in the stores in general chose between food and drinks packaged in glass or cardboard vs anything else: chances are glass or cardboard packaging is the healthier choice. Aluminum cans should still be okayish too, tho they possibly layered it with plastic inside too depending on the pH of the contents to slow down reactions between can and product.
There is no living creature and no source of water without microplastics in it. Newborns have it in their blood and ground water has concentrations of it.
yes, that is correct. I never said it would bring your intake to zero. But those appear to be big ways of microplastic intake we can control: food+packaging and food+heat. Harder to control the air you breathe in the city...
Oh i know you weren’t looking for zero, but reduction and end-user changes won’t fix the issue any more than a bandage on a leaking tire in a flood. It’s just like other pollution issues, it has to be cut off or regulated at the source.
Don't reuse plastic that isn't rated for repeated use
Is it really rated for micro plastics? Or is it rated for chemical leeching?
Seems you can easily accidentally scrape off micro pieces of plastic from any container I assume is intended for reuse or food storage.
Ban plastic. There is literally no other way. Nothing you do on an individual level will have the slightest bit of impact at all. Government has to treat plastic like Freon/DDT or any other chemical that was banned world-wide because of huge unexpected impact.
They can't ban literally all plastic; it's irreplaceable in some medical applications.
It's irreplaceable in a lot of applications. There's a reason we're using so much of it. Even in applications where it can be replaced, doing so would result in burning more fuel to transport the other, heavier material, accelerating global warming. Lose-lose.
It's also likely an uneccessary nuclear response to the situation. I doubt every plastic is as bad, do studies and ban the worst/least useful plastics and work your way from there.
I mean synthetic textiles alone make up almost half of the plastic in the ocean.
Use natural fiber clothing only, no polyester, just cotton or whatever other natural fibers. Try to use less packaged food. But one of the major sources of microplastics is tire wear from vehicles, not sure what can be done about from a personal level other than not drive, which, I mean, who's really gonna do that?
Fuckcars would like to have a word with you about that last thing
Of course they will, but the simple fact of the matter is that it is not possible or reasonable to get by without a car in most places in the US. Elsewhere in the world, maybe. Cities, maybe. But not most of the US.
Most of the US population lives in cities, just like in any other industrialised country.
Wait do we have a fuckcars now? Link please!
we have two: [email protected] and [email protected]
Most societies actually got around perfectly fine for most of history without driving. It's really only in the past seventy years or so that urban planners brains collectively escaped their heads and started designing cities where it's impossible to do anything without exploding some old dinosaur goo in a giant expensive death machine.
They also didn't often travel very far.
Because their cities were designed in sensible ways where that wasn't necessary.
Parts of the country are still halfway reasonable. I'm in Manhattan, and can walk twenty minutes to Penn Station, where I can hop on a train and be in downtown Philadelphia in under two hours. I can get to most places in NYC by subway faster than you could drive there. A train to the airport can get me anywhere in the world.
None of this requires a car, and air travel aside, this was how most of the developed world was set up for the past several hundred years.
One more reason to wear a well-fitted respirator
I would fucking love to not drive. Just don't take away my fitnesswear.
Unfortunately, all of the best fitness wear is polyester or otherwise plastic based. And it's so far superior to the alternatives that there is no switching away from it.
I just remembered there are some great products made of bamboo, wool, or hemp! Yah, the vast majority of great products are plastic. Perhaps one day we'll have like a scale or way to know if basically the product lasts or if it will shed a lot of plastic. That way we could switch to great plastic rather than stop using it entirely. Oof.
I'm not super into running a marathon in wool or bamboo
Let me think. Ah: We could actually solve two problems at once, microplastics and rolling resistance, by using steel wheels on steel streets. Make a street lane two beams of steel, that saves on material, and the wheels conical so that they follow those beams automatically, replacing the car's differential. In case we need more grip we can spray sand, though as the street is now steel we can also use magnets for breaking. I should patent that!
Hmm, interesting regarding them coming from vehicles. As far as microplastics from clothing, does anyone know if they are absorbed through the skin? I would think they would only readily be absorded thought food and water intake, but I am just surmising.
Apparently, they are mostly absorbed from drinking water and inhalation in relatively equal amounts according to science direct.
Mostly clothes form microplastics during cleaning which end up in the waterways.
You breathe in the microscopic particles created from abrasion.
Not driving isn't an option in my area. Not if you want to be employed.
Its a 30 minute drive to the bus stop to get to work. Plus travel time along bus stops.
Its a 35 minute drive to the front door.
If its still half an hour to just get to the bus stop, what's the point even, at a personal level?
Captain Planet told me in the 90s what was gonna happen. Corporations just took it as a play book to accelerate shit.
No polyester is difficult 😭 do you know if there any other natural fibers somewhat comparable or breathable, for cycling etc.?
No driving is easy for me right now - my car has two wheels and I'm the engine 🚲🤪
The two largest sources of microplastics are clothing and car tires. Clothing is a pretty easy fix. Only buy natural fibers like cotton, wool, etc. For car tires you will have to drive less. These two sources account for more than half of microplastics.
Natural fibers are often outside the price range of the average person. Until prices come down or wages go up, people will keep wearing polyester clothing.
For tires, I'm hopeful that technology will improve the composition of tires, or even make them out of a modified form of natural rubber, but switching most transport to rail seems like the superior option here.
??? Cotton is usually the cheapest thing I see.
Even natural rubber makes microplastics.
Companies love to charge a premium for cotton here (Canada). I try to get Cotton, Linen and Hemp as much as possible, but I end up paying $80 for a t-shirt instead of $30.
Carbon tax