In the past decade, the words  “microplastics” and “microbeads” have been regularly thrown around by the media and academics, becoming a buzzword of sorts in the bigger discussion about environmental degradation. They warn of the health hazards it brings to oceanic wildlife and humans alike, and its exacerbated impacts on climate change in the long run. But what are these “microplastics”, and why should we care in the first place?

 

Young woman cleaning microplastics from sand on the beach, which fish or young turtles may mistake for as food and consume.

 

Put simply, microplastics are tiny plastic particles, often defined as being five millimetres or less in diameter (National Geography, n.a.). Microplastics are sorted into two main groups, namely primary and secondary.

 

Primary microplastics are derived from its use in an array of commercial products, especially in the cosmetic industry to serve as exfoliators, emulsifiers or just as a cheap filler. Known more commonly as microbeads, they are largely found in facial cleansers, exfoliating shower gels, toothpaste and other cleaning products like hand soaps. Just take a look at the labels on your shower products to see if they contain Polyethylene – that’s the chemical name for the little bits of plastics found within. When you use these products and wash them down the drain, they bypass the water treatment plants and flow straight into the ocean. They exist in different sizes, but a good number of them are microscopic and invisible to the naked eye. Water treatment systems are not designed to filter out these microplastics, hence they get carried into lakes, rivers and oceans.

 

Infographic showing the way in which microbeads in our daily health products can harm ocean wildlife.

 

Secondary microplastics come from the breakdown of bigger plastics in the oceans like water bottles, straws and plastic bags. These single-use plastics end up in the ocean by various means, whether it be inconsiderate people littering directly in the oceans, or through water runoff and winds carrying microplastics into water bodies.

 

So we now know what microplastics are, but what really is the problem? Whether primary or secondary, fish and other oceanic wildlife often confuse microplastics for food and end up ingesting them. At the top of the food chain, we humans are likely to also eat these marine animals that already have microplastics in their system, making us vulnerable to the health risks associated with microplastic ingestion. In addition, these microplastics become the breeding ground for bacteria (Drahl, 2016), and can combine with chemicals that are harmful to individuals. A study conducted by several professors from the John Hopkins University in the USA, as well as the University of Toronto in Canada, found that the ingestion of microplastics had potentially disastrous impacts on health. These include “enhanced inflammatory response, size-related toxicity of plastic particles, chemical transfer of adsorbed chemical pollutants, and disruption of the gut microbiome” (Smith, Love, Rochman and Neff, 2018).

 

A fish cut open to reveal microplastics found in its body. While much of the plastics are removed during the cleaning process, smaller plastic bits may remain on the fish when we consume it.

 

It seems easy to dismiss the problem of microplastic pollution in oceans and other water bodies, simply because we can’t see them the same way we can see plastic bottles, plastic wrappers or plastic bags floating on water surfaces. However, this is precisely the reason we need to pay extra attention to the way we use microplastics in our everyday lives. By being ignorant of where our microplastics go, we eventually pose avoidable risks to our own health and safety and that of those we love. So donate your microbead-filled cleansers to research laboratories that need them, or dispose of them safely by running the contents through a fine sieve before discarding the microbeads safely in the trash. Together, we can ensure that a problem as massive as this can eventually become a microscopic one.

 

Bibliography:

Drahl, C., 2016. What You Need To Know About Microbeads, The Banned Bath Product Ingredients.  Forbes. Retrieved 31 August 2020, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/carmendrahl/2016/01/09/what-you-need-to-know-about-microbeads-the-banned-bath-product-ingredients/#440b853a7a33

National Geographic Society. 2020. Microplastics. Retrieved 31 August 2020, from https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/microplastics

Smith, M., Love, D., Rochman, C. and Neff, R., 2018. Microplastics in Seafood and the Implications for Human Health. Current Environmental Health Reports, 5(3), 375-386. Retrieved 31 August 2020, from https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s40572-018-0206-z.pdf