WARNING ON PLASTIC's TOXIC THREAT

[Anonymous]

Warning on plastic’s toxic threat
Plastic
waste in the oceans poses a potentially devastating long-term toxic
threat to the food chain, according to marine scientists.Studies
suggest billions of microscopic plastic fragments drifting underwater
are concentrating pollutants like DDT.Most attention has focused on
dangers that visible items of plastic waste pose to seabirds and other
wildlife.But researchers are warning that the risk of hidden
contamination could be more serious.

Albatross chicks
Dr
Richard Thompson of the University of Plymouth has investigated how
plastic degrades in the water and how tiny marine organisms, such as
barnacles and sand-hoppers, respond.He told the BBC: “We know that
plastics in the marine environment will accumulate and concentrate
toxic chemicals from the surrounding seawater and you can get
concentrations several thousand times greater than in the surrounding
water on the surface of the plastic.”Now there’s the potential for
those chemicals to be released to those marine organisms if they then
eat the plastic.”

Shoreline mess
Once inside an organism, the
risk is that the toxins may then be transferred into the creature
itself.”There are different conditions in the gut environment compared
to surrounding sea water and so the conditions that cause those
chemicals to accumulate on the surface of the plastic may well be
reversed – leading to a release of those chemicals when the plastic is
eaten.”It is as if the plastic particles act as magnets for poisons in
the ocean.In an experiment involving plastic carrier bags immersed off
a jetty in Plymouth harbour, he is assessing the time taken for them to
fragment.In related projects, he and colleagues have also added plastic
powder to aquarium sediment to establish how much is ingested by marine
life. Research on stretches of shoreline has shown that, at the
microscopic level, plastic pollution is far worse than feared.Dr
Thompson worries toxins may be released to marine organismsIn a typical
sample of the sandy material gathered at the high tide mark on
shorelines, one-quarter of the total weight may be composed of plastic
particles.Studies have found that plastic traces have been identified
on all seven continents.

Here on Midway, Matt Brown of the US
Fish and Wildlife Service echoes the warnings of a long-term threat
from plastic waste.”The thing that’s most worrisome about the plastic
is its tenaciousness, its durability. It’s not going to go away in my
lifetime or my children’s lifetimes.”The plastic washing up on the
beach today – if people don’t take it away it’ll still be here when my
grandchildren walk these beaches.”

[Author]

April 1, 2008 at 11:45 AM