Should we drink tea bags with no?
Water mites were exposed to various sizes of microplastic and nanoplastic tea bags. According to the research team, although these creatures survived, they showed signs of anatomical and behavioral abnormalities.
New research suggests that tea cups may contain millions of microscopic plastic particles. In the wake of the plastic war, attention is now turning to popular beverages.
As a tea-loving people, the British consume more than 62 billion cups of tea a year, but while they may think that their tea bags are made only of tea and paper, many of these teas actually contain polypropylene. Which is used to close the bag to keep it as it is).
A number of tea bag makers, including Clipper, Abel and Cole, have tried to remove the chemical from their production cycle, but since others are still trying to find a solution, we have to admit that many Some of our favorite brands still contain plastic.
According to the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology, researchers at McGill University were looking to find out if plastic tea bag plastic could repel micro and nanoplastic particles when brewing tea.
Given that scientists still do not know whether these microscopic particles are harmful to the body, the research team tried to find out how plastic affects small aquatic organisms called Daphne magna or blue mites. These organisms are often used in environmental research.
To conduct their experiments, the researchers prepared packages from four different brands of tea bags that are supplied in plastic bags. They opened the bag, took out the dry tea, and washed the empty bag. The bags were then boiled in a container of water to simulate the brewing mode.
Using an electron microscope, the team discovered that a plastic bag releases about 11.6 billion microplastics and 3.1 billion nanoplastics into water at inhalation temperature. The researchers say that this amount of plastic is thousands of times higher than previously reported in other foods.
In another experiment, the researchers exposed water mites to different sizes of microplastic and nanoplastic tea bags. According to the research team, although these creatures survived, they showed signs of anatomical and behavioral abnormalities.
Thus, they concluded that although the findings are worrying, more research is needed to determine whether these plastics can have short-term or long-term effects on the human body.
Clipper (one of the largest tea brands in the UK) announced in 2018 that it was launching a tea bag without plastic (packages) made from bananas. The company announced that since October 2018, it has changed all its production to this new type, which uses natural plant materials instead of polypropylene plastic adhesive.