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Letters | Peel that apple? Microplastic invasion of healthy foods demands policy action

  • Reports in scientific journals suggest microplastics have started to infest even fruits and vegetables needed for a healthy diet
  • When humanity must worry about the risks of eating healthy food, it is morally irresponsible for leaders to focus only on economic and political battles

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Malagueta beach in Malaga, Spain, is strewn with plastic bags and bottles after the summer solstice in June 2018. Microplastics from disintegrating plastic waste and other sources are increasingly working their way into the food supply. Photo: Reuters
Letters

Two newly released reports warn that microplastic pollution is widespread, even in fruits and vegetables which are essential for a healthy diet.

One report published in the journal Environmental Research suggested microplastics could be absorbed by fruits and vegetables from the soil via their roots. Among the samples studied, apples recorded the highest number of microplastics. One gram of apple and carrot contained an average of 195,500 and 101,950 micro- and nano-plastic particles, respectively.

Some believe microplastics may be deposited on the peels of fruit because of plastic packaging, and that we can avoid ingesting them by peeling the fruit. But it is worrying that we can no longer avoid consuming microplastics even if we stop eating seafood and fruit peels.
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Should vegetarians who want to help tackle the climate crisis by not eating carbon-intense meat such as beef worry that their plant-based diet could make them sick from microplastic-contaminated fruit and vegetables? So much for the saying “an apple a day keeps the doctor away”.

Meanwhile, a paper in the journal Science projected that 11 billion tonnes of plastic will accumulate in the environment by 2025 and that most of those microplastics are synthetic microfibres from the textile industry. They can be carried by winds or storms, crossing continents before being deposited onto the soil and oceans through precipitation.

02:09

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Thailand’s plastic waste surges as coronavirus lockdown increases demand for food delivery
While plastic is durable, it is also fragile. For instance, a Styrofoam lunchbox has a useful lifespan of about an hour and then becomes a piece of problematic plastic waste. If the box does not end up in a leakproof landfill, it will slowly disintegrate into tens of millions pieces of microplastic that will eventually rest on our dinner plates.
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