Disturbing find exposes problem taking over Aussie waterways: 'Eating a whole dose'
Globally, there's some 5.25 trillion plastic particles floating on the ocean's surface. In Australia, we've found 70,000 pieces per square metre in some areas.
Conservationists are calling for more funding from state and federal governments to combat the devastating issue of microplastics in our waterways, with some coastal spots recording an astonishing 70,000 pieces per square metre.
Experts say much more education and awareness is needed to reduce the amount of plastics that end up in our oceans, lakes and lagoons, which not only can prove dangerous or fatal to aquatic life, but also to humans as well.
Dr Michelle Blewitt of the Australian Microplastic Assessment Project (AUSMAP), told Yahoo News Australia tiny fragments, varying in size from five millimetres to under one, are being washed into our waterways in record numbers.
Globally, there are an estimated 5.25 trillion plastic particles floating on the surface of the ocean, which together weigh 269,000 tonnes — the equivalent of about 2,150 blue whales, the world's largest mammal.
The flow-on effect of microplastics in Aussie waterways
Blewitt says there are thousands of different ways in which micro and nanoplastics can end up in our waterways, including every time Aussies wash their clothes, when millions of tiny microfibres are shed and released. When these plastics make their way into our oceans, they're often eaten by fish and aquatic life and when humans eat those species, they too ingest the plastic.
Speaking from South Australia, where the issue is particularly prevalent — and where recently, West Lakes in Adelaide was revealed to be the one of the worst spots in the country for microplastic pollution — Blewitt says now is the time for action. "So anything that's dropped, created, spilled in through catchments, is what's flowing down the stormwater network and then landing in these coastal areas," she explained.
"Anything less than five millilitres in size is considered microplastic, and if it gets smaller than one millilitre, it becomes nanoplastics, and then picoplastics, until we're breathing it in."
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Blewitt said that much of this waste is similar in appearance to our native animals' natural diet, and over time, some of it even contract a "smell" that can make them even more enticing to wildlife.
"Industrial pellets are what we call primary microplastics and that gets made from virgin plastic into these round objects that look very much like fish eggs," she said. "They're then being consumed by birds, by fish and by invertebrates that are living in the sediment.
"When microplastics get out in the ocean, it gets coated in fishy, stinky, bloody smells from the sea, and so it becomes very attractive to birds, and to other species that then consume it and then often feed it to their own young as well."
To make matters worse, Blewitt said, there may been a whole range of other chemicals and contaminants in the water — from DDTs, runoff from the local golf course, dog poo or sewerage — "that are then getting soaked into these plastics, because it acts like a magnet".
"Whatever is consuming these plastics, then get a dose of those chemicals as well," she said. "Obviously we don't eat and consume the stomachs of fish very often, for example, but what we do know is that when you're eating the whole animal, like prawn or like an oyster, you're eating a whole dose."
Plastics even being found inside human tissue
Blewitt said that microplastics are being found all over the world to have contaminated not just the food we eat, but also the insides of body. "They've now found plastics in just about everything from salt, to honey, vegetables — it's even being taken up by the roots," she said.
"It's being found in men's testicles, so they think it's could lead to a decline in fertility. It's been found in brain tissue. It's been found in arteries, clogged arteries of heart patients."
The situation is becoming increasingly dire, on home soil and around the world, meaning now is the time Australians must put their plastic use under the microscope, Blewitt urged.
"It's about education and allowing the people like us, our small programs that have been working tirelessly to be able to do just what we do, to monitor and assess these areas, because if it wasn't for groups like us these areas of hotspots would go unnoticed," she said.
"It's about education too. And so once we know more, you do more and and so it's just trying to recognise your own plastic footprint in your day and making those small changes to be able to try and minimise this — just trying to lead as much as we can a lesser plastic life."
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