Plastic is a material invented by humans that has gone from non-existent to being spread uncontrollably throughout the planet. Micro and nanoplastics have been detected in the oceans, in the air, in rain, in our food, in the water we drink and even in our cells. However, if there are still many questions about this form of pollution and its effects, it is largely due to the great complexity of investigating on such a small scale, with such tiny contaminants.
The water we drink is an example of this challenge. Where are there more microplastics: what comes out of the tap at home or what is bottled in plastic?
A study published now from the Enviroplanet research network has found 89 times more microplastics (nanograms per liter) in bottled water than in tap water in Spanish cities. Howeverother research This same year, the Institute of Environmental Diagnosis and Water Studies (IDAEA-CSIC) found something more in the network than in the bottled water, just the opposite.
This disparity in results is due, among things, to the use of different methods to detect micro- and nanoplastics that cover different sizes, since today there is no approved technique followed by all research.
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This is one of the most used methods, but there are other systems to avoid having to count such tiny particles in the microscope. In the IDAEA-CSIC research, they separate the micro- and nanoplastics with ultrafiltration equipment, dissolve them in toluene and pass the solution through a mass spectrometer. This way they find what types of polymers are in the water and in what quantity.
A new technique developed by researchers at Columbia University (USA) to detect increasingly smaller plastic fragments found on average close to 100,000 particles (most of them nano) in a liter of water in a plastic bottle, a quantity much higher than those estimated until now.
Regardless of the technique used, it is clear that we are drinking plastic. Although the number of microparticles is very high, the mass concentrations of what we ingest are usually quite low. As Roberto Rosal, Enviroplanet scientist, emphasizes, even taking the highest measurement of 1,600 nanograms per liter from these two recent investigations in Spain, to ingest one gram of plastic with glasses of this water it would be necessary to drink 625,000 liters. And if the recommendation to drink three liters of water a day is considered, it would take more than 570 years to achieve this.
Now, you have to be careful. This may seem like an insignificant amount, but here, again, the problem is just how small it is. As Marinella Farré, a researcher at the IDAEA-CSIC, points out, “the smaller it is, the more it scares me.” “If it is too big, I will swallow it and it will probably be in the intestine for a while, but it will eventually come out. But if it is small or small enough, it can pass through the tissues and then be absorbed into the body, staying there.”
The fact that human beings are drinking, eating and breathing micro- and nanoplastics can affect their health in two ways: due to the presence of these foreign particles in some parts of the body and due to the effects of the chemical additives used in the manufacture of these materials.
Micro and nanoplastics have already been found throughout human geography: blood, placenta, breast milk, inside cells… This same week, new research warned of another area where they have been detected: testicles. Although there are still many questions about how this affects health, the study of carotid artery is one of the first to link this contamination with human diseases. Experimental work is needed to confirm these conclusions, since these investigations are always complicated by the risk of contamination of these tiny plastics in the laboratories themselves.
As Emma Calikanzaros, an ISGlobal researcher who works with microplastics, points out, “with this type of small particles, some figures may seem insignificant, but the problem is that we are exposed to them everywhere, every day.” Furthermore, as she points out, “apart from all types of plastics and additives, we do not know the effects that the mixture of all of them has on the body, the cocktail effect of these substances.”
Microplastics everywhere
While most people talk about microplastic pollution in the oceans, the greatest exposure for humans is in their own homes. In the last century, houses have been filled with objects and materials made with these polymers. They are everywhere: in food packaging, in electronic equipment, in synthetic textiles, in cosmetics…
Washing clothes is one of the main sources of microplastics, since washing machines release a large amount of microfilaments down the drain. But the wear and tear of the textile itself also releases fragments into homes. According to Nicolás Olea, professor of Radiology and Physical Medicine at the University of Granada, house dust contains mainly plastic microfilaments from textiles, especially polyester and, to a lesser extent, polyamide (nylon). “Nowadays the majority of textiles are also plastic, if we talk about food packaging For food packaging, I explain that clothing is human packaginghuman packaging, because we are stuck in plastic,” comments this epidemiology expert.
Apart from textiles, electronic equipment and cosmetics, Professor Olea also draws attention to the odorants used in some homes and to some consumer products with plastic that replace old alternatives that they did not have before, such as tea bags. He also warns about other items widely used on a daily basis in recent years: masks. “One of the most striking accumulations of plastic in the body is in the lung tissue and polypropylene dominates, a material linked to masks,” emphasizes the professor. “This is a mess, isn’t it?”
Although it is difficult to find scientific data on this type of pollution in homes, due to its magnitude and the size of the particles, Enviroplanet researchers have verified how microplastics spread uncontrollably throughout Spain. They have observed how wastewater from homes and industries continues to come out of treatment plants with a large amount of plastic microparticles and ends up in rivers or agricultural fields (through sludge). And with the help of airplanes they have also found concentrations equivalent to a billion microplastics in the sky over Madrid, between 1,500 and 2,000 meters high.
In this way, transported by river and ocean water, as well as by wind, atmospheric currents or raindrops, plastic microparticles have been disseminated throughout the planet. “Plastic is a material that we cannot live without in our industrial society, it is a very useful material that we need,” emphasizes Rosal, from the Enviroplanet scientific platform. “We must manage this material so that the waste does not continue to spread uncontrollably,” says the researcher, who defends that with this form of contamination “it is easy to fall into alarmism.”
The plastic tide last January on the Galician coast, caused by millions of pellets dumped at the same time into the sea, made very visible the magnitude of this pollution, which normally goes unnoticed, as it is dispersed in the form of tiny particles invisible to the human eye. However, these pellets that reach the oceans constitute a tiny part of the problem.
At the moment, international negotiations are taking place to try to have the text of the first global treaty against plastic pollution ready by the end of 2024. Meanwhile, the production of this material continues to grow in the world, while scientific research increases to try to learn more about its impact in very small sizes.
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