Chemical pollution a threat comparable to climate change, scientists warn
Chemical pollution a threat comparable to climate change, scientists warn
www.theguardian.com
Chemical pollution a threat comparable to climate change, scientists warn
12 comments
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I don't think it's comparable. Climate change is far more dire and time sensitive.
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I dunno, the proliferation of pfas everywhere is pretty detrimental to life on this planet. In general it is the result of the same kind of industrial criminal negligence and weaksauce regulations.
We really should have tackled both issues decades ago but yay line go up right now, so fuck the future.
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PFAS is a massive problem certainly worth tackling, but as bad as it is, I don't think it's an existential threat with a very short time window to prevent devastation of the species like climate change is.
Theoretically there's no reason we can't tackle both problems at once, but personally I would advocate pumping as much resources as humanly possible into preventing climate change first, if that's the only way politicians will deal with it.
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It doesn't matter how warm the earth gets if the soil and water is so polluted we cannot grow crops
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The exact effect of these chemicals is still not known. Microplastics seem capable of limiting crop yields, so that's certainly a horrific issue combined with reduced yields from climate change as well. But chemicals in general, as horrific as they are, are not quite an existential threat capable of completely destroying our ability to grow food.
Current farming practices depleting topsoil is a bigger threat to food production than chemicals, generally, except for pesticides likely causing the collapse of the bee population, which is an existential threat.
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Unfortunately, it is a recommendation to eat more organic food, but it is more expensive in general. So at least washing fruit and vegetables before eating them, but organic if you can afford it.”
No, this is terrible advice. It doesn't protect you at all, and you're much better off spending that same amount of money on simply eating a generally healthier, more plant based diet with less processed food.
If you're already a healthy-weight, 90%-vegetarian who has good house ventilation with clean air, THEN maybe swapping to all-organic might help, but that's hardly proven. Pesticide residu on food is basically at the limit of detection, and after it's washed, you're looking at such minute traces you often can't even find it without specialized lab equipment. And there is no real reason to believe organic pesticides are less unhealthy. And in some places organic farmers are STILL ALLOWED to use non-organic pesticides if they "have to".
And what you especially shouldn't do is blindly eat your own homegrown food. That bag of compost is full of PFAS, that ground you're sitting on could be a massive health risk. Get your soil tested if you're eating homegrown, doubly if you live remotely urban.
Farms get inspected, and they mostly know what they're doing. Your neighbor could be spreading clouds of god knows what in your garden unknowingly. You could be right at the landing spot of an upwind factory. Maybe the previous owners dumped their dirty engine oil where you grow food, or your houses used to be next to a gasworks or a drycleaners.
If you ever go swimming in a river, you're practically bathing in pollutants and animal shit. You wouldn't even touch that water if it was in a bucket, but people happily swim in it, and dunk their faces in it.
Do you ever bake or fry food? You know how small birds generally die quickly when kept in the kitchen? That same stuff goes right into your lungs too, you're just too big to drop dead instantly, but it's literally a canarie in your kitchen.
Ever sit at a campfire? Use a fireplace? All that soot it going straight into your lungs, even in a closed burner. Most of the fine dust goes up the chimney, down to the ground and straight back into your house. You're pretty much smoking a tree right there. And while solid fuels are bad, gas and oil are only somewhat better. And of course, your neighbors cause the same effects. On good piece of meat on the smoker is more harmful to your body than months of trace residu
Most people have no idea how many hazardous chemicals they come in contact with. Eating organic food is basically the final thing you could do. It's a fraction of a fraction of a difference.
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Maybe I‘m being too suspicious here, and should take off my tinfoil hat, but this plastic panic feels a bit like the next distraction by oil companies to stop any movement on the energy transition. Especially these types of articles where it’s said that both are equally bad, or plastic pollution is the next climate crisis.
The climate crisis will render most of the earth uninhabitable within a 100 years if businesses as usual continues. But the plastic pollution crisis is thus far mostly hypothetical, yes it’s everywhere, yes it’s probably not the healthiest substance to have in your body, but most articles fail to mention any proven effects even remotely close to the health effects of, for example, smoking.
Again maybe I‘m completely wrong here, or it’s the classic stupidity of journalists misinterpreting and exaggerating earnest science.
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"do you want to progress or do you want babies wrapped in itchy leaves"
12 comments
No no, it must be the vaccines that are the problem
Especially now that they’re deregulating everything and shutting down all the consumer protection agencies