Plastics pollution: Paving way for microplastic intrusion in our ecosphere

Plastics have been an inevitable part of our daily life. From dawn to dusk, our hands are full of plastic materials. From the toothbrush to health and beauty products in the morning, and  mobile, laptop, and teacups we use throughout the day, are all made up of plastics. Plastics seem to have confined our daily activities and are playing a crucial role as we humans have been embracing them. Human dynamics would be in trouble if plastics get discarded instantly. The basic needs will crumble and the modern world would seem naked without plastics. Hence, there is no doubt, everything is interweaved in plastics.

Places with no apparent human activities are disturbed by plastic pollution. Plastics and its small particles have reached everywhere from the highest peak, Mt Everest to the bottom of the oceans. The pervasive presence of plastics has the potential to transform our once vibrant world into a lifeless one.

What happens to plastics in the long run?

Eventually, these plastics degrade and break into small pieces and the process continues further like mitosis. This transformation is due to physical, chemical or biological degradation. This process continues at a very slow rate and takes several hundred years depending on the properties of plastics. Even microscopic plastics have the same potential to disrupt the functioning of the environment in which they are present, or even more than their parent form. These microscopic plastics have a name: micro-nano-plastics!

What exactly is microplastics?

Micro-plastics are small particles of plastics having a thickness less than 5 mm. However, there is a misconception among people that microplastic are microscopic only, while they are visible through naked eyes as well. Other forms of microscopic plastics include nano plastics having a thickness less than 1 nanometer, which is approximately 40 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair.  These microplastics come from our kitchen while chopping vegetables and fruits and scrape them off from a plastic chopping board or even from food packaging. 

Have you ever heard of a plastic polymer, Teflon? It is used in non-stick cookware. 

Under every circumstance, our habits are generally engrained in plastics which ultimately has caused the expulsion of microplastics in the environment. 

Is microplastic everywhere?

Delving into five of our basic needs into consideration: air, water, food, clothes and shelter, we can in a way find them exposed with the microplastics. We are already  aware that the air we breathe is massively polluted. According to the research carried out in surface road dust in three cities, higher microplastics were observed in commercial areas like shops and restaurants. Among the study areas, higher concentration of microplastic was observed in Da Nang and Kathmandu as compared to Kusats in surface road dust. Even in the Polar Regions where human dominance is less or absent , plastic pollution levels have been increasing alarmingly. 

Human tissues and organs are contaminated with microplastics. Scientists from the Netherlands found microplastic in human blood with a dominant Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) polymer. A study carried out in the USA proved that microplastics have been transferred through the food chain and food web within the trophic structures. Although microplastics are omnipresent and omnipotent, it is beyond the scope of estimation. It’s all because micro-plastics are heterogeneous and do not have uniform spatial distribution. What do you think are the other reasons? 

Footprint of plastics and microplastics

Plastics have reached wherever humans had left their footprint. Even the arctic region has been facing plastic pollution issues. Among the seven continents, all of the continents are found to have been contaminated by microplastics. Antarctica being one of the globally important regions for carbon sink and indicator region for Climate Change, is potentially under threat due to overwhelming plastic pollution. According to one research carried out in Antarctica, microplastics of nylon and polyethylene polymer were dominant in the benthic macroinvertebrates. This shows that there is a higher probability of transfer of microplastics to higher trophic level through the food web/ food chain. However, a detailed research is missing on distribution, transfer and accumulation of micro-plastics over ecosystems.  

Plastics for birds: Boon or curse?

We’ve been witnessing incidents where fish get entangled in plastic nets and marine animals ingest plastics. Have you ever witnessed such incidents? Maybe not. However, one of my friends shared that she rescued Barn Swallow, a common neighborhood bird near houses in hills of Nepal, from the scrambled polythene bags on a road. You might have seen it atleast on social media. It is evident that bird entanglement occurs in plastic materials. Adding more to this, plastic entanglements are also observed inside the body of birds in guts, stomach, gastro-intestinal tracts, etc. Many researches show the presence of microplastics inside the body of birds. Even the lungs seem to be contaminated by microplastics by inhalation through air according to few researches. Polypropylene, polyethylene, and ethylene vinyl acetate are the major dominant polymer types found in the lungs of avifauna in Japan. Gut obstruction and subsequent starvation are health issues observed in France due to micro-plastics contamination on birds. Ever since, plastics are now nesting materials for birds, majorly in urban areas. The study carried out in Spain found that the rate of mortality and predation was higher in nests made from plastic materials than nests free from plastics. It may herald that Predators get attracted to the vibrant colors of plastics.

Are microplastic harmful?

While delving deeper, exploring the occurrence, abundance, and distribution of microplastics across different layers is a significant advancement. However, it remains crucial to urgently investigate and understand the impact of microplastic contamination on the environment and, ultimately, human health. Some research revealed that humans on longer exposure to micro-plastics through either air, water or food can face a challenge of loss of bone tissue, liver and lungs inflammation and cancer, change in metabolic activities and many abnormalities. The facial products with microplastics can enhance the rate of penetration of UV rays through skin tissues as well. One of the research exposed that even the neurological and reproductive activities get altered if we are exposed to certain chemicals contaminated by plastic polymers. Once the health of humans, the guardian of the Earth, is under threat due to microplastics, the future shall be insane. So, we must call for action as micro-plastics taint its pristine zones and devastate the ecosystem as a whole where the Earth seems to be lifeless.

The global organizer of the World Earth Day has announced the theme as Planet vs Plastics for the year 2024 with the aim of reducing 60 percent of plastics by 2040 and creating a plastic-free Earth. “All this plastic was produced by a petrochemical industry with an abysmal record of toxic emissions, spills, and explosions,” said Denis Hayes, a Chair Emeritus of earthday.org. Although if the plastic production ceased, the remnant plastics over the Earth that have been produced and distributed so far seems very difficult to manage. Attempting to reduce the use of single-use plastics and the application of circular economy is a way further to enhance the green environment. Several advances in the contemporary approach  of 3 R’s principles have been driven drastically by several global environmental issues. One of the reasons is plastic pollution and its solution.