Longtime So Cal resident Charles Carr is a nationally published journalist and playwright. His award-winning stories and articles have appeared in college textbooks published by Macmillan, St. Martin's Press, Bedford, and others. Charles enjoys writing a regular column for his hometown newspapers, The Times-Advocate and The Roadrunner.
Easy ways you can reduce your exposure to harmful microplastics TODAY
In the 1967 movie classic, The Graduate, an older man comes up to a 20-something Dustin Hoffman at his college graduation party and whispers, "I want to say one word to you. Just one word: plastics." It was meant to be a laugh line in its day, but no one's laughing now. Nearly 60 years later, the world has literally inundated itself with rivers of plastic waste that make their way to every ocean, where it is consumed by fish, birds, and every other creature on the planet. Including us.
In many ways plastic is a wonderful product. It's cheap to produce and lasts almost forever. But when it does finally degrade, it creates tiny particles called microplastics which are increasingly linked to myriad health risks.
Speaking to a Fox affiliate, Doctor Hong-Sheng Wang, a cardiologist toxicologist and professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, noted, “In the past eight years the amount of microplastics in the human brain increased by fifty percent," an amount he said directly correlates with our increasing use of plastics. Wang also cited a recent study “that shows in those patients where microplastics were found in the arterial plaques, they have a substantially higher chance, I think it’s about four-fold higher chance, of having heart attack, having heart stroke, having stroke and death.”
According to bettergoods.org, "A 2021 study found that microplastics can cause serious impacts on the human body, including physical stress and damage, apoptosis, necrosis, inflammation, oxidative stress and immune responses."
Let's do a countdown of five simple things you can do right now that will dramatically lower your exposure to these harmful materials and, if adopted worldwide, will turn the plastics industry on its head.
#5 – Don’t microwave plastic -- even if it's labeled “microwave safe.”
In a 2023 study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, food microwaved for just three minutes in FDA-approved polypropylene and polyethylene containers leached millions of plastic particles into food. Microwave food in glass or ceramic containers instead.
#4 - Reduce single-use plastics
It's not just plastic bags at the checkout counter. It's soda and water bottles bottles, detergents and other cleaning products, beauty and personal care products, and the hard "blister packaging" -- you know, the thing you always manage to slice a finger on -- used for pretty much anything that hangs off a hook. Tens of billion of units of plastic packaging are created annually in the U.S. alone, the vast majority of which provide less than zero benefit outside of reduced cost and convenience for the manufacturer.
#3 - Clear the airborne
Use an air purifier with a HEPA filter to pull micro particles out of the air. If your outside air quality is good, open up windows and doors. Avoid synthetic clothing which discharge plastic fibers into the air which are inhaled. Nylon and polyester alone make up nearly three quarters of our clothing and create plastic household dust which eventually settles to the floor. Where babies play.
#2 - Simpler is better
Believe it or not, the better living through chemistry folks have actually created particles even smaller than microplastics called nanobeads which are intentionally put into body washes, exfoliators, toothpastes, and other personal care products. The United Nations Environment Program estimates a typical exfoliating shower gel might contain as much plastic in the form of nanobeads as are in its bottle. Really study those labels and try to buy products that contain ingredients you are familiar with and have reason to trust, not some who-knows-what list of ingredients 20+ letters long.
#1 - And the single best thing you can do to reduce the ingestion of plastic into your body:
Stop drinking water from disposable plastic water bottles. You're getting millions of microplastic particles which leech from the bottles. Even worse, the bottles themselves are rarely recycled. A recent study by Nature Medicine estimated that making this one change alone could reduce your exposure to micro particles by 90%.
Purchase a $10-15 reusable bottle at Target or Walmart -- stainless steel or glass inside, plastic outside. Fill it with good old fashioned tap water, which has a tiny fraction of the bad stuff (NDRC.org reports that at least two-thirds of bottled water is tap water anyway, the micro plastic you get from the bottles is a bonus), or water from a home filtration system, which has close to zero. On top of the health and the environmental benefits, you'll save hundreds of dollars a year -- thousands if you also use a reusable container for your morning coffee instead of buying from expensive boutique shops.
---------
We are peculiar creatures. We demand real lemon oil in our furniture polish but are perfectly fine putting the fake junk in our lemonade. There's a place for plastic in our world but not in our waterways, or in the dust swirling in our houses, or in the food and drinks we consume. We managed perfectly well using other types of containers and packaging before the plastic tsunami rolled in. Companies will stop using them if we stop buying them. We're already we're seeing detergents and other items with plastic containers being offered with minimal, often biodegradable packaging. A recent study revealed that the biggest contributors to plastic pollution are some of the world’s most popular brands. Names like Coca-Cola, Nestle, and Unilever. Goliaths admittedly, but that also means there are relatively fewer corporate board members who have to get the message. The message we've been sending up to now is "Keep making it and telling us it is not harmful and is being disposed of properly."
There's a long history of consumers speaking up, saying enough is enough using the clearest language known to corporate decision makers: withholding purchase. And it can happen fast.
Almost as fast as you can say Betamax, McDonalds Mozzarella Sticks, Microsoft Zune, Burger King Satisfries, CNN+ or New Coke.