In the American television series Breaking Bad, a chemistry teacher who is told he has lung cancer makes a drastic change of direction. In order to leave his family a nice inheritance, he decides to produce synthetic drugs together with one of his former students. By mixing the right chemicals, he creates crystal methamphetamine, a highly addictive and dangerous drug. It is no surprise that the drug is on the Opium List as a banned substance.
Mixing chemicals to make a hard drug is illegal. Adding chemicals to plastic packaging without prior research into the consequences is not. These all-important studies are still only conducted after the fact, when the damage has already been done. Research at Ningxia Medical University has recently shown that heating plastic packaging, such as a quick microwave meal, leads to a significant increase in the number of chemicals and microplastics in our food. For example, the number of microplastic particles in a litre of water heated in a plastic baby bottle increases from 600,000 at 25ºC to 550 million at 95ºC. These are particles to which we unknowingly expose ourselves and our loved ones.
Other research shows that one square centimetre of packaging leaks around 4.2 million particles of microplastic, regardless of whether the packaging has been in the microwave for one minute or five minutes. These microplastics and chemicals enter our digestive system through our food and affect the microbiome in our intestines: the bacteria, viruses and yeasts responsible for processing the nutrients from our food. And an unbalanced microbiome in turn promotes the development of cardiovascular diseases such as congestive heart failure.
So stop ingesting dangerous chemicals by eating directly from (heated) plastic food packaging. Instead, buy fresh products, preferably unpackaged in plastic. And ban the microwave from your home, so that cooking with chemicals remains something for chemists in television series.
Are you also concerned about the health risks of all the plastic around us? Does all the plastic packaging in the supermarket make it hard for you to decide what to buy? And do you want to see a ban on disposable plastic soon? Then please support the Plastic Soup Foundation in our journey towards a plastic-free industry.
Rynaldo Koerhuis (1995) advises, sells and writes. He writes a blog for The Plastic Soup Foundation twice a month on a current topic.
