Scientists studied five different types of seafood. 100 percent were contaminated with plastics

[marmar]

(Salon) Anew study that examined five different types of seafood found that traces of plastic contaminants were present in every single sample — suggesting that humans ingest a large amount of plastic pollution from eating seafood both wild and farmed.

The study, which was conducted by a group of scientists led by doctoral candidate Francisca Ribeiro from the University of Queensland's Queensland Alliance for Environmental Health Sciences, investigated 10 raw samples of wild sardines, 10 raw samples of farmed tiger prawns, 10 wild squid, 10 oysters and five wild blue crab. The authors' goal was to develop a simple quantitative means to improve plastic contamination detection methods.

The researchers found that every single one of the samples had plastic in them, although the extent varied quite a bit. The researchers measured the amount of plastic pollution per gram of seafood tissue, and found that sardines had the highest percentage: about 0.3 milligrams of plastic per gram of tissue, meaning that one would ingest 30 milligrams of plastic after consuming an average serving of sardines.

Squid, oysters and prawns all had about 0.01 milligrams of plastic per gram of tissue, while crabs has 0.03 milligrams of plastic per gram of tissue weight. An average 100-gram serving of crab would cause one to ingest about 3 milligrams of plastic. ..............(more)

https://www.salon.com/2020/08/17/scientists-studied-five-different-types-of-seafood-100-percent-were-contaminated-with-plastics/