“What’s in the Air” is a column by Dominique Browning, Moms Clean Air Force Co-Founder and Director, in which she explores life today through the lens of air quality and public health.
My father was a surgeon, and my sisters and I spent time helping with admin at his office. We loved watching him at work. My entire life (and psyche) has been shaped one way or another by memories of people stopping him in the street to thank him for saving the life of a child or a parent. And as well by noting how few women doctors there were at the hospital where we would go every Sunday for lunch in the cafeteria. But that’s another story.
One of my jobs was to put equipment into sterilizing units. Another involved changing rolls of paper on tables. All of which is to say that I now pay attention to the offices of doctors I visit. I was shocked recently to be ushered into a chair covered in a thin film of plastic. Totally unnecessary and wasteful. Plastic has helped save lives—think of the flexible IV lines—but what’s in that plastic that might have longer term consequences? I have no idea what chemicals are in the plastics of dental guards and other orthodontia, remedies for problems that are in the warm mouths of children all day and night.
And that cafeteria we visited every Sunday? As in all cafeterias and restaurants and cafés we all visited back then, we ate with metal utensils, and watched our trays and dishes and knives and forks get loaded onto a conveyer belt to go through enormous dishwashers and come out sparkling for the next use. Now everyone throws away tons of plastic spoons and containers and those horrible little packs of mustard and relish that are impossible to open neatly and impossible to save if you only use a tiny dollop.
Tell President Biden: Negotiate a Powerful Global Plastics Treaty
So much waste. And so many unknowns—because the industry isn’t sharing information about what’s in their plastic products. Why do I care?
Here’s an excerpt from an open letter to the people negotiating the upcoming Global Plastics Treaty:
Plastics used in health care require thousands of hazardous additives (including carcinogens, neurotoxicants, endocrine disruptors) that can leach from products and waste, and persist in the environment, threatening patients, communities, workers (including waste workers), and ecosystems. Exposure to hazardous chemicals from plastic is a particular concern for vulnerable patients, including fetuses, newborns, and young children. This toxicity and chronic exposure represents a significant burden of care for the health system around the world. In addition, the lack of full product ingredient information impedes efforts to reuse, recycle, and move to safer alternatives. Transparency and traceability of hazardous chemicals in health care products and articles is therefore essential to speed up the redesign and detoxification of plastic products.
Please read the letter here, and sign on if you are a health professional, or share it with someone who is.
Why should you care? The plastics industry is heavily polluting. It has caused swathes of our country to be blanketed in carcinogens of such intensity that we actually refer to a part of the Gulf Coast as “Cancer Alley.” We know what’s happening, and for generations, we’ve done nothing. That’s why Moms Clean Air Force was thrilled by the recent EPA announcement that would protect communities from the pollution from hundreds of chemical facilities—mostly in Texas and Louisiana, but around the country too.
It doesn’t have to be this way. We can change laws, and regulations, to protect ourselves and our loved ones. We can demand change. And we can reduce our reliance on something we never used to need—the ripoff of water in plastic bottles, for instance, in nonemergency situations. We can each do what we can. But we need large-scale systemic change. That’s why the Global Plastics Treaty matters, that’s why our work at Moms Clean Air Force matters.
Learn more about Moms’ work on petrochemical pollution.
Tell President Biden: Negotiate a Powerful Global Plastics Treaty