Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

Bottled water is a scam. It&#x27;s less regulated than municipal tap water in most developed nations, companies suck up water from small towns and use tons of fuel to ship it out of those watersheds and then charge people 1000% markup.<p>For countries without clean water, the effort should be put into getting municipal water supplies.<p>Don&#x27;t buy plastic disposable water bottles if you live in a developed nation. They prop up a terrible industry, generate tons of waste, use tons of oil and it&#x27;s less clean than just drinking from a water fountain.<p>Edit: the documentary Tapped is a great film about the bottled water industry, and Blue Gold is a good one about the water industry in general.

For anyone else wondering what effect microplastics actually have on the human body, it looks like the effects are still up in the air. Animal studies [0] show that microplastics can be taken up by tissue and circulation, and they are also present in the air [1]. Not sure what impact drinking bottled water would have on concentration inside the body. I couldn&#x27;t find any long term studies on their effect on cancer, which is my main concern for any foreign contaminant entering the body.<p>Food (or drink :) for thought!<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;setac.onlinelibrary.wiley.com&#x2F;doi&#x2F;abs&#x2F;10.1002&#x2F;ieam.5630030412" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;setac.onlinelibrary.wiley.com&#x2F;doi&#x2F;abs&#x2F;10.1002&#x2F;ieam.5...</a><p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;link.springer.com&#x2F;chapter&#x2F;10.1007&#x2F;978-3-319-71279-6_13" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;link.springer.com&#x2F;chapter&#x2F;10.1007&#x2F;978-3-319-71279-6_...</a>

Or not..<p>&quot;believed to be microplastics&quot;<p>&quot;there is a chance the Nile Red dye is adhering to another unknown substance other than plastic.&quot;<p>So it may, or may not be microplastics that they found&#x2F;counted.

Tap water is about the same, old one: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theguardian.com&#x2F;environment&#x2F;2017&#x2F;sep&#x2F;06&#x2F;plastic-fibres-found-tap-water-around-world-study-reveals" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theguardian.com&#x2F;environment&#x2F;2017&#x2F;sep&#x2F;06&#x2F;plastic-...</a><p>This is just our devouring of the planet, nothing to see here. Now reinsert head in ass and press play.

Here are the actual results: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;orbmedia.org&#x2F;stories&#x2F;plus-plastic" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;orbmedia.org&#x2F;stories&#x2F;plus-plastic</a><p>I wish there had been more European water brands tested, as out of this list I only know Evian and San Pellegrino, and they are the two least contaminated brands, but they are also a bit more upscale than what most people drink.

While there may be some questions regarding the exact methodologies used in this study and its accuracy, it is still pretty fucking scary to hear that microplastics are in so much of the water we drink and bottled companies are not filtering it out sufficiently.

0.1 millimeter or larger is not really that small, it&#x27;s the size of fine sand. I admittedly never look for sand in bottled water but just assumed that such large particles would never make it through the filters.

I use a Berkey filtration system and feel mildly optimistic about not drinking plastic every time I fill my glass. From late September, 2017 [0].<p>&gt; &quot;There is nowhere really where you can say these are being trapped 100%. In terms of fibres, the diameter is 10 microns across and it would be very unusual to find that level of filtration in our drinking water systems.” With that being said, we know that the berkey can filter down to 2 microns and less, so until testing is done, we can only state that the berkey would be filtering out more of these microplastics than your town&#x27;s municipal water filtering system<p>[0](<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bigberkeywaterfilters.com&#x2F;blog&#x2F;category&#x2F;microplastics&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bigberkeywaterfilters.com&#x2F;blog&#x2F;category&#x2F;micropla...</a>)

Scary shit. An aside: what are people using for tap filters? Is Brita still the go-to company, or are there other better solutions?

Hmm. That&#x27;s concerning.<p>I had more or less switched entirely off bottled water and now only use a combination of filtered tap water + reusable insulated bottles ala Kleen Kanteen at home and work, but I have recently started buying more sparkling water &#x2F; club soda in an attempt to ween myself off Coke.<p>Perhaps it&#x27;s time I take the plunge and buy a SodaStream or comparable water carbonator.

I worked in a lab and where we used an atomic force microscope to scan single DNA strands on flat surfaces. At first we couldn&#x27;t &quot;read&quot; anything as the surface was covered in gunk from the water we used, switching to water in glass bottles fixed this.

I live in the U.S. The tap water in my neck of the woods is disgusting. It is a water tank on top of a hill that has open vents and is surrounded by trees, moss and much worse. There is nothing stopping anyone from throwing a water balloon filled with (insert whatever) at the vent. Hikers pass it every day at vent level. The pipes leading up to it leak about 20k gallons of water into the mountainside every day. There are testing taps every few miles on my road and I see them sometimes taking samples. I do not feel comfortable even showering in this water. I certainly would not drink it intentionally.<p>For bottled water, I get the bottles made of rigid plastic that may have less chance of leaching chemicals over a short period of time. Only time will tell if I chose correctly.

Now that we know that microplastics are in our water supply, what do we do to protect ourselves? Do reverse osmosis filters, etc, at home get rid of these plastics? It certainly sounds dangerous and scary but I don&#x27;t know what I need to do or should do, which is frustrating.

When we moved to Boulder from New York recently we got some really weird looks for buying a plastic bottle of water at the store. I actually felt some joy from receiving that tacit disapproval. Soon after we joined the herd in using stainless steel bottles in our car, backpacks, etc - something we aspired to in New York but was hard to commit to when there&#x27;s a deli on every corner.

I wonder what the contamination stats are for canned water, carton water and glass bottle water. I do drink a lot of carbonated lacroix.

Let&#x27;s remember the macroplastic of the bottle holding the water that outside Flint, MI is unnecessary pollution in nearly every country of people reading these words.<p>We can all stop buying bottled water. It won&#x27;t solve every problem, but it will solve a lot of this one, while saving you money and focusing people on cleaning your current sources.

I was wondering if there was anything that established what microplastics actually do. Found an interesting paper here: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;resodema.org&#x2F;publications&#x2F;publication9.pdf" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;resodema.org&#x2F;publications&#x2F;publication9.pdf</a>

&quot;It&#x27;s so difficult to get people to care about things they can&#x27;t see.&quot;

I drink a specific brand of bottled water because I don&#x27;t like the taste of tap water. Filtering it takes some of the bad taste away, but adds none of the good.<p>I&#x27;ll have to add &quot;microplastic&quot; as another one of my favorite spices.

More than once I felt mild nausea after drinking directly from a bottle, whereas pouring the water out of the bottle into a glass was fine.<p>I suspect it’s not just what’s in the water but the bottle itself that’s not good.

Couldn&#x27;t the microplastics just come from the plastic bottles the water is bottled in?

I&#x27;m surprised we are not using plant based plastics.

We should move to plant based plastics.

Keep in mind they only tested 11 brands from 9 countries.

According to them: Avoid Nestle Pure Life. San Pellegrino, Evian, and Dasani are OK.

Somebody got paid to find out if water in plastic bottles has plastic in it.