塑料消费品中的化学物质有多危险?

塑料消费品中的化学物质有多危险?

By now, most people know the Earth is overwhelmed with plastic. It drifts in our oceans and swims in our drinking water, piling up in landfills to last for generations. To combat the plastic pollution, you do what you can, taking reusable bags to the grocery store and not using straws. But a new report may make you rethink your plastic consumption completely.

到目前为止，大多数人都知道地球上到处都是塑料。它漂浮在我们的海洋中，在我们的饮用水中游泳，堆积在垃圾填埋场中，世代相传。为了对抗塑料污染，你尽你所能，带着环保袋去杂货店，不用吸管。但是一份新的报告可能会让你彻底反思你的塑料消费。

Your plastic yogurt container may contain harmful toxins, but it's not a simple equation. Researchers say the sheer volume of chemicals in various consumer products like this make it impossible to know what's in them. (Photo: Africa Studio/Shutterstock)

Norwegian researchers studied many everyday items — from yogurt cups to bath sponges — and found toxic chemicals in three-quarters of them.

挪威研究人员研究了很多日常用品——从酸奶杯到沐浴海绵——发现其中四分之三含有有毒化学物质。

"The problem is that plastics are made of a complex chemical cocktail, so we often don't know exactly what substances are in the products we use. For most of the thousands of chemicals, we have no way to tell whether they are safe or not," co-author Martin Wagner, a biologist at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, said in a statement.

“问题是塑料是由一种复杂的化学混合物制成的，所以我们常常不知道我们使用的产品中究竟含有什么物质。对于数千种化学物质中的大多数，我们无法判断它们是否安全，”合著者、挪威科技大学生物学家马丁瓦格纳(Martin Wagner)在一份声明中说。

"This is because, practically speaking, it's impossible to trace all of these compounds. And manufacturers may or may not know the ingredients of their products, but even if they know, they are not required to disclose this information."

“这是因为，实际上，不可能追踪所有这些化合物。制造商可能知道也可能不知道他们产品的成分，但即使他们知道，他们也不需要披露这些信息。”

It's not easy to isolate the chemicals or the specific plastics. There are more than 5,000 types of plastic, with thousands of types of chemicals used to make them. Researchers are aware of more than 4,000 chemicals used just in plastic food packaging, so the overall number of chemicals is likely much greater.

要分离出这些化学物质或特定的塑料并不容易。世界上有超过5000种塑料，以及数千种用于制造塑料的化学物质。研究人员发现，仅在塑料食品包装中就使用了4000多种化学物质，所以总的化学物质数量可能要多得多。

For the study, which was published in Environmental Science and Technology, the researchers found more than 1,400 substances in the plastics they studied, but were only able to identify 260 of them. They found that 60% of the plastic products had general toxicity; 40% produced oxidative stress (which is thought to be linked to cancer, diabetes and heart disease); and 30% had endocrine-disrupting effects (which are linked to cancer and developmental issues).

这项研究发表在《环境科学与技术》(Environmental Science and Technology)杂志上，研究人员在他们研究的塑料中发现了1400多种物质，但只能识别其中的260种。他们发现60%的塑料制品具有一般毒性;40%的人产生氧化应激(氧化应激被认为与癌症、糖尿病和心脏病有关);30%有内分泌干扰作用(这与癌症和发育问题有关)。

Some plastics are safer bets than others. (Photo: Stakes/Shutterstock)

Of the plastics they studied, the team found that the chemicals in polyvinyl chloride (PVC, usually marked as 3s in recycling codes) and polyurethane (PUR) were the most toxic. By comparison, polyethylene terephthalate (PET, usually marked as 1s) and high-density polyethylene (HDPE, usually marked as 2s) were less toxic.

在他们研究的塑料中，研究小组发现聚氯乙烯(PVC，通常在回收代码中标记为3s)和聚氨酯(PUR)中的化学物质毒性最大。相比之下，聚对苯二甲酸乙二醇酯(PET，通常标记为1s)和高密度聚乙烯(HDPE，通常标记为2s)毒性较低。

"Plastics contain chemicals that trigger negative effects in a culture dish. Even though we do not know whether this will affect our health, such chemicals simply shouldn't be in plastics in the first place," Wagner says.

“塑料含有化学物质，会在培养皿中引发负面影响。即使我们不知道这是否会影响我们的健康，这些化学物质根本就不应该出现在塑料制品中，”瓦格纳说。

And researchers point out that it's not easy to know what you're looking for. For example, they tested four different yogurt containers and found toxic chemicals in just two of them.

研究人员指出，要知道你在寻找什么并不容易。例如，他们测试了四种不同的酸奶容器，发现其中只有两种含有有毒化学物质。

Although this sounds disheartening for people who want to make safe, informed shopping decisions, the researchers have some helpful advice. The first, is obviously, is to cut back on plastic use. Try to avoid PVC, which is labeled with recycling code #3, and plastics labeled as #7, because it's not clear what type of plastics they are made from.

尽管这对于那些想要做出安全、明智的购物决定的人来说听起来令人沮丧，但研究人员有一些有用的建议。首先，很明显，是减少塑料的使用。尽量避免PVC，它的标签上写着回收代码#3，而塑料的标签上写着#7，因为不清楚它们是由什么塑料制成的。

They also suggest working with retailers and companies to ask what materials and chemicals are in their plastic products.

他们还建议与零售商和公司合作，询问他们的塑料产品中含有哪些材料和化学物质。

"We need to avoid demonizing plastics," Wagner says. "But given that we live in the plastic age, we need to make sure they don't affect our health."

“我们需要避免妖魔化塑料，”瓦格纳说。“但鉴于我们生活在塑料时代，我们需要确保它们不会影响我们的健康。”