REDUCING EXPOSURE
Microplastics appear to be everywhere on the planet. But is it possible to avoid exposure to them in everyday life? Because you can’t always see microplastics, you don’t know when they’re entering your body, but there are steps you can take to reduce the volume you come into contact with.
Firstly, you can change the containers that you eat or drink out of. For example, replace disposable coffee cups with stainless steel or glass ones and stop microwaving foods in plastic containers. Plastic can enter your food much more easily when heated, so transferring it into another dish can reduce how much plastic you accidentally consume. Plastic tea bags are capable of releasing 11.6 billion microplastics and 3.1 billion nanoplastics into your drink. To avoid this, you can replace them with loose leaf tea. Similarly, when choosing meals to eat, cutting down on seafood consumption can reduce how many of these particles enter your body.
Every time you wash clothes made of nylon, polyester or acrylic, you release hundreds of thousands of microfibres. To avoid releasing these microplastics, you can check the materials of clothes before buying them or install a filter into the washing machine to catch any that come loose. Additionally, when choosing cosmetics to apply to your skin, it helps to choose products that don’t contain any microbeads or any form of plastic ingredient.