Washing Your Face Lead to Death

Does it ever cross your mind that your personal care products could actually cause a
catastrophe in our life? If it is not then from now on you should start to stop using any
personal care products such as soap, toothpaste, face exfoliators, etc. that contain
microbeads. The reason why we should stop is wastewater treatment plant could not filter
microbeads and they flow directly into the ocean. Unfortunately, many sea creatures
mistook microbeads for their food. As sea creatures feed on microbeads, it stays in their
body and could potentially move up the food chain. Who knows, in the fish dishes we ate
last night there are microbeads we could not see and that microbeads were accumulated
in body digestion system. Right now, microbeads scattered in the ocean are numerous
and this could harm not only marine’s life but also human’s.

A single microbead can be up to a million times more toxic than the water around it
(Rochman, et al., 2013) and this condition could lead sea creature’s life to death.
Microbeads contain materials that could absorb Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs).
POPs are organic compounds that are resistant to environmental degradation through
chemical, biological, and photolytic processes (Ritter, et al., 1995). Meanwhile, during the
wastewater treatment plant process, microbeads are mixed with any other wastewater
that has a big chance containing POPs. These potentially cause microbeads to absorb
POPs from their surroundings. As a result, if sea creatures feed on microbeads, that
means they also feed on POPs. POPs are toxic enough to the sea creature.
Consequently, based on the research, around 35% of 670 fish examined (total of 6
species) had microplastics in their stomachs (Anon., 2017).

People who consume fish as their daily food could have bigger chance to suffer from
a health problem. In fact, the majority of Indonesia’s area was the ocean. Approximately
2/3 parts of Indonesia are ocean and the other 1/3 parts are land. Supposing this fact,
many Indonesian people consume fish as their daily food especially people who live near
the ocean. In addition, fish also distributed to the city within a great number in order to
supply fish demand from many restaurants in the city and surprisingly based on 2015
research, 6 out of 11 species of fish in Indonesia contains microplastics on their gut
(Rochman, et al., 2015). This fact must be a nightmare for Indonesian people. The
microplastics have been moved up the food chains as they keep staying in the fish body
until consumed by a human. As mentioned before, microplastics are potentially containing
POPs which is toxic. If human keeps eating fish which contains POPs in their body, they
might experience some problem related to their health.

Overall, any changes in environment start from ourselves. We are the key to a friendly
environment. We could start with the smallest action like stop using products that contain
microbeads. As we stop using it, we are willing to save the marine life and also our
generation with the better living environment.

References
Anon., 2017. Beat The Microbead. [Online]
Available at: http://www.beatthemicrobead.org/science/
[Accessed 17 11 2017].
Ritter, L. et al., 1995. A Review of Selected Persistent Organic Pollutants, s.l.: IPCS
(International Programme on Chemical Safety).
Rochman, C. M., Hoh, E., Kurobe, T. & Teh, S. J., 2013. Ingested Plastic Transfer
Hazardous Chemicals to Fish and Induces Hepatic Stress, s.l.: nature.com.
Rochman, C. M. et al., 2015. Anthropogenic debris in seafood. Plastic Debris and
Fibers from Textiles in Fish and Bivalves Sold for Human Consumption.