Climatide

Sea Education Association/Skye Moret

Floating plastic debris collected using a plankton net.

NPR’s Jon Hamilton has a sobering report on the potential health risks of plastics. George Bittner, one of the study’s authors and a professor of biology at the University of Texas, Austin, tells Hamilton that he and his colleagues bought more than 450 plastic items designed to come into contact with food, chopped them into little pieces (like what’s in the ocean), soaked them in alcohol or saltwater (not ocean water, but similar), and tested what came out.

The testing showed that more than 70 percent of the products released chemicals that acted like estrogen. And that was before they exposed the stuff to real-world conditions: simulated sunlight, dishwashing and microwaving, Bittner says.

“Then, you greatly increase the probability that you’re going to get chemicals having estrogenic activity released,” he says, adding that more than 95 percent of the products tested positive after undergoing this sort of stress.

You’ve probably heard of one estrogen-like chemical – bisphenol-A, or BPA. It’s been in the news over the past few years because of its presence in plastic baby bottles and other food containers. The public spotlight has spawned a wave of BPA-free plastic products. But the new research makes it clear that’s not enough.

The team concentrated on BPA-free baby bottles and water bottles, Bittner says, “and all of them released chemicals having estrogenic activity.” Sometimes the BPA-free products had even more activity than products known to contain BPA.

Now, this isn’t an issue I’ve mentioned much here on Climatide, but as a mom – heck, a human being – it weighs heavily on my mind. It’s also something that scientists studying plastic debris in the ocean have told me they think about a lot. It’s been mostly speculation without a lot of data to back it up, but the concern is that plastic debris in the ocean could be releasing hormone-like chemicals into the water or into the bodies of animals that eat or attach themselves to the plastic pieces. This study doesn’t address the potential health risks these chemicals pose for either humans or animals, but it certainly lends weight to the concerns.

The study has been accepted for publication in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.