The plastic in your water bottle is as small as a micron.Using new laser techniques, biophysicists at Columbia and Rutgers universities discovered about 250,000 pieces of nanoplastics per liter of five different brands of bottled water, says Andrew Wong, MD, primary care provider for the Hartford HealthCare Medical Group in Westport."These are a micron in size. For reference, a strand of hair is 80 microns in width," says Dr. Wong. "There have been studies on what's visible to the naked eye, but not to this number."The pieces, he says, are polyethylene plastic molecules broken off from the bottles or the plastic filters used in production.>Relacionado: ¿Están los 'químicos eternos' ocultos afectando su salud?
Plastic won't affect the taste, but could be dangerous to consume.While not affecting the water's taste or texture, it's possible the plastic can be dangerous to consume, Dr. Wong says."We know certain types of plastic carcinogenic, but they're not used to make plastic bottles. Yet, we know water bottle waste affects multiple systems in sea life," he says.The body can absorb the particles and even cross the blood/brain barrier to trigger cellular structure or DNA damage."We know cancer has increased 13% in the last 10 years in people under 50, probably the biggest consumers of bottled water," Dr. Wong begins. "We also know the risk of colon cancer is two to four times higher in people born after 1990."At the same time, he notes a 15% increase in digestive disorders like inflammatory bowel and Crohn's diseases."We don't know the cause of these increases, so now need to investigate the impact of plastic water bottles," Dr. Wong says.>¿Quieres más noticias de salud? Envíe StartHere al 85209 para registrarse para recibir alertas de texto
Tres formas más seguras de beber agua No ha habido ninguna medida para restringir la disponibilidad de agua embotellada, pero el Dr. Wong sugiere estas opciones para consumir agua:
Utilice recipientes de aluminio o vidrio.
Beba agua del grifo.
Filtre el agua a través de un dispositivo de agua de cerámica o a base de carbón.
Pero si usa botellas de agua de plástico, no cometa este error. ¿Aún le gusta la facilidad de las botellas de agua de plástico? Simplemente no las exponga al calor ni al sol, como dejarlas en un automóvil durante el día. El sol causa que el plástico se rompa", dice el Dr. Wong.
