Modern life is ‘plasticized,’ conveying enormous benefits to our lives in hygiene, convenience and colour. Plastics are everywhere within the home, in food packaging, cooking utensils, children’s toys, building materials and household equipment. Plastics result from the petrochemical industry (non-sustainable and environmentally disastrous) and are environmentally hazardous throughout their lifecycle; starting with their production which involves large-scale pollution, releasing potent chemicals such as dioxins, phthalates and toxic metals into our environment; and affecting human, animal, plant and aquatic life. Plastic is given different qualities through treatment with a cocktail of other terrifying chemicals, all of which can leach out of the individual products and into air (you know that new plastic smell?), water or something in close proximity to the plastic. And then what do we do? We wrap our food up in it! Most supermarket food is placed on polystyrene trays, packed and smothered in cling film, displayed in glossy punnets, or preserved in tins lined with plastics. Next we eat the food (and possibly the leached plastic chemicals) and chuck the packaging into the bin. From here the plastics stay with us forever, being largely un-biodegradable. Tiny fragments of plastics are accumulating in the Pacific Ocean and wreaking havoc throughout the food chain. If the plastics are burnt, then they release a stream of unpronounceable and highly toxic chemicals into the environment (posing a huge risk to the health of fire-fighters, and possibly proving fatal to occupants of burning buildings who inhale PVC fumes). Plastics are quite literally a problem that will not go away.
They appear to be so useful and hygienic, but can seep dangerous chemicals into the foods which they come into contact with, possibly exacerbated by heat (think oven-safe and microwaveable packaging). Recent studies across America (including the University of Rochester and the National Centre for Environmental Health) have suggested that phthalates (chemicals found in plastics such as Clingfilm, vinyl and plastic bags) can cross the placenta, damaging the sexual development of male children (this is also recognised in other mammals) resulting in physical and possibly behavioural problems. A team of Swedish researchers have linked the household use of plastics to an increase in eczema, asthma and other allergies, and there is concern that the immature bodies of children and babies are at increased risk of toxic damage and build up of plastic chemicals, found in food packaging, toys and drinking bottles. (Several types of plastics have been phased out of use for toys of young children due to their health-risk). Further research has indicated a link between the use of plastics around food and the development of certain cancers such as breast cancer, immune problems, and even infertility.
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