FoodPackagingForum

Leo: We have eliminated most plastic in our homes. Glass and stainless steel are our mainstays. Plastic should only be for essential uses (flights, for example).

Olwenn: Cook from scratch with fresh ingredients as often as possible, even when packaged in glass or stainless steel, food may have come in contact with plastics or other materials from which chemicals may migrate during production.

Pete Myers: I stopped heating food in plastic (including microwave) almost 30 years ago. Don’t believe the labels that a particular plastic is “microwave safe.”

We are having a discussion between an optimist, a pessimist and a nihilist in the room. The majority of us believes we are not (yet) screwed and we can (still) fix it. Any damage that we can still avoid is a benefit.

Microplastics in your bloodstream will cause inflammation because the body will recognize it as foreign particle.

Leo T: when you see microplastics, you are not seeing a million times chemical molecules that are known to contribute to disease and disability in all of us. We have a lot to work out about microplastics - more we don’t know than we know. But microplastics are a flag that the exposures are as visible as invisible.

Leo T: Endocrine disruption is mainstream science. Don’t listen to me but listen to the Endocrine Society, international federation of Gynecologists and Obstetricians, American Academy of Pediatrics, World Health Organization and United Nations Environment Programme. All have declared chemicals in plastics as a global public health threat.

There is good evidence that plastic pollution has a negative impact on nature. There is some early evidence indicating that nano/microplastics have adverse effects on human health as well, including our reproduction. However, we do not know how much micro- and nanoplastic humans are inhaling or eating, so the health risks remain uncertain at the moment. What we do know, however, is that chemicals used in plastics have demonstrated negative effects on human health, e.g. BPA is linked to several types of cancer as well as reproductive effects.

Maricel M: in the last 60 years, the number of new food packaging materials has greatly increased; however many of the chemicals used have been approved by regulators decades ago with little to no data. And their safety hasn’t been reviewed. We have telescopes taking pictures of old and new galaxies but we haven’t yet agreed that BPA is a health concern.

Ksenia: Microplastics are doing essentially two things: 1) causing local inflammation, and possibly systemic inflammation as well; 2) releasing chemicals, which get a shorter track to enter the body, e.g. through the gut wall.