Beware of microplastics in gloves and microwave ovens

Researchers found that common nitrile and latex lab gloves can shed stearic acid particles that closely resemble microplastics, “increasing the risk of false positives when studying microplastic pollution,” reports ScienceDaily.

Researchers have found that these gloves can inadvertently transfer particles to lab instruments used to analyze air, water and other environmental samples. The contamination comes from stearates, which are not plastics but look very similar to them during testing. Because of this, scientists may be detecting particles that are not actually microplastics.

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Stearates are salt-based, soap-like substances added to disposable gloves to make them easy to separate. However, their chemical similarity to some plastics makes them difficult to distinguish in laboratory analyses, increasing the risk of false positives when studying microplastic pollution.

But microplastics are everywhere now, even in devices that until now we considered harmless.

A new report by Greenpeace International , based on 24 recent studies, outlines the risks associated with ready-to-eat meals in plastic packaging. They say that the “microwave safe” label mainly refers to the plastic’s resistance to heat, not whether substances are released into the food.

One study showed that in five minutes of heating, 326.000 to 534.000 microplastic particles can be transferred to food. Nanoplastics can enter the bloodstream and vital organs.

Plastic materials contain over 4.200 chemicals, many of which are not adequately controlled in food packaging. Some have been linked to serious health problems, including hormonal disruptions, infertility, metabolic diseases and cancer.

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