PLASTICS, which used to be one of the most useful discoveries of modern society, has become today’s scourge. They come in handy, light, malleable, unbreakable and cheap. Name it and there is always a plastic counterpart of it. Unfortunately, the price to pay is higher than its actual cost.
Plastics become so common that no one pays attention to them anymore. Once unusable, people just throw plastics away. They don’t bother to recycle them, as they are cheap anyway.
Today, plastics are everywhere. Most of them end up in the oceans, where they are not needed and even pollute the waters. “I think everyone agrees that plastic waste does not belong in the ocean or the environment,” said David Taylor, chairman of the Alliance to End Plastic Waste (AEPW), an organization of nearly 30 major industrial and consumer-goods companies, which launched a $1-billion initiative to tackle plastic waste.
In a report released a few years ago, the Ocean Conservancy singled out the Philippines as one of the five countries from where the majority of plastics originates. The other four countries were China, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.
“The low cost and convenience of plastic sheets, as well as inefficient waste disposal, has made the Philippines one of the world’s leading plastic polluters, with tremendous negative impacts on the environment,” the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF)-Philippines said in a statement.
A paper, “Status of Solid Waste Management in the Philippines,” authored by Alicia Castillo and Suchiro Otoma, said that about 35,580 tons of garbage is generated every day in the country. “On the average, each person produces about 0.5 kilogram and 0.3 kilogram of garbage every day in the urban and rural areas, respectively,” it stated.
It’s very alarming, indeed. “We produce 2.7 metric tons of plastic waste every year,” deplored Environment Secretary Roy A. Cimatu. Based on 2017 International Coastal Cleanup report, among some of the top items listed were plastic bottles and caps, straws and stirrers, and various types of plastic bags.
Various plastics are used in the manufacture of each consumer item, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Worldwatch Institute. For fibers and textiles, polyester is used while carbonated drink bottles, peanut butter jars, plastic film, and microwaveable packaging, the material used in polyethylene terephthalate. High-density polyethylene is used for detergent bottles, milk jugs and molded plastic cases.
Bottle caps, drinking straws, yogurt containers, appliances, car fenders (bumpers), and plastic pressure pipe systems are made of polypropylene, according to the institute. Packaging foam, food containers, plastic tableware, disposable cups, plate, cutlery, and compact discs and cassette boxes come from polystyrene.
Because they are cheap, plastics have become a part of Filipinos’ daily life, stressed Juvinia P. Serafin, senior environmental management specialist of the Environmental Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.
Plastics come in the form of credit cards, food containers and package, utensils, sachet packs, kitchen wares, toys and furniture. But the most popular of them all is plastic bags, which are used only once.
“Plastics, particularly those for single-use packaging, has greatly contributed to the degradation of the environment,” deplored Cimatu. “Plastic pollution continues to poison our oceans and injure marine life. When not properly disposed, they clog waterways and cause flooding.”
Worldwatch Institute said that the world discard 500 billion plastic bags. “We recycle only 5 percent of the plastic we produce,” it said, adding that “sunshine breaks plastic down into smaller pieces, but it doesn’t go away.”
Barry E. DiGregorio wrote in an article that “disposed plastic materials can remain in the environment for up to 2,000 years and longer.” After all, plastics are made of materials that are supposed to last forever.
The WWF claimed that nearly 200 different marine species die due to ingestion and choking from plastic bags.
“Discarded plastic bands encircle mammals, fish, and birds and tighten as their bodies grow,” reminded the Washington, D.C.-based World Resources Institute. “Turtles, whales and other marine mammals have died after eating plastic sheeting.”
The Philippines became the toast of international media when it was found that the cause of death of a whale was ingesting 40 kilograms of plastics. “Plastic was just bursting out of its stomach,” Darrell Blatchley, who conducted the post-mortem of the whale, told National Geographic. “We pulled out the first bag, then the second. By the time we hit 16 sacks—on top of the plastic bags, and the snack bags, and big tangles of nylon ropes, you’re like seriously?”
He could not believe what he saw. “The plastic in some areas was so compact it was almost becoming calcified, almost like a solid brick,” he was quoted as saying by The New York Times. “It had been there for so long it had started to compact.”
What most people don’t know that plastics also affect human health. Studies have found that toxic chemicals leach out of plastic and are found in the blood and tissue of nearly all of human beings. Two broad classes of plastic-related are of critical concern for human health: bisphenol A and additives used in the synthesis of plastics, which are known as phthalates. This was found out in a study conducted by the Arizona State University Biodesign Institute.
Exposure to these toxic chemicals is linked to cancers, birth defects, impaired immunity, endocrine disruption and other ailments, it said.
Another concern: microplastics, which are generally less than 5 millimeters in diameter. “[These] can harm juvenile fish which can ultimately harm fish stock,” Serafin said.
In addition, microplastics can provide the medium for the bioaccumulation of potentially toxic pollutants in the food chain. “Plastic particles can absorb industrial and agricultural pollutants causing damage to fish organs,” Serafin said.
Environmentalists caution against burning those plastics to get rid of them completely. Scientists say that chlorine-based plastics, when incinerated, contribute to the formation of dioxins, a poisonous waste that forms when chlorine is exposed to extreme heat.
“Dioxins are considered highly toxic and are implicated in weakening the immune system, affecting fetal development and causing a skin disorder called chloracne,” wrote Cynthia P. Shea, a former staff member of Worldwatch Institute.
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