R.A.R.E - Rare Animals Really Endangered

Beautiful day to clean up trash (NE Coast) as we prepare for our third and final “Sculpture” for Badou Primary School. Thank you to all the extra hands and shout out to TIKI Republik and Blue Dot Treat for making the day extra special. Happy Birthday Owen!!

A study published Tuesday in the Lancet Planetary Health highlights how humanity's continued reliance on plastics—which are primarily derived from planet-heating fossil fuels—is expected to harm global health over the next couple of decades.

" Plastics life cycles emit a range of gases and pollutants that contribute to the global burden of disease, including greenhouse gases that drive climate change, air pollutants linked to respiratory illnesses, and hazardous chemicals associated with cancers and other noncommunicable diseases," the study explains.

"These emissions occur across all stages of the plastics value chain: from oil and gas extraction, which provides the feedstocks for more than 90% of global plastics; to polymer production and product manufacturing, global transportation, recycling, and formal or informal waste management and mismanagement; to the gradual degradation of plastics in the environment," the publication continues.

Researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, as well as France's University of Toulouse, modeled various scenarios of plastics production, consumption, and disposal from 2016-40.

"The study is the first of its kind to assess the number of healthy years of life lost ('disability-adjusted life years' or 'DALYS'—a measure of harm) due to greenhouse gases, air pollutants, and toxic chemicals emitted across the life cycle of plastics at a global scale," according to LSHTM.

The team estimated that without any changes in global plastics policies and practices, annual health impacts would soar from 2.1 million DALYs in 2016 to 4.5 million DALYs by 2040—with a total of 83 million healthy years of life lost over the full study period. Under a business-as-usual scenario, 40% of the health harms would be tied to rising temperatures, nearly a third to air pollution, and over a quarter to toxic chemicals.

Because of limited data—particularly on the use stage of plastics and the chemicals they contain—lead author Megan Deeney of LSHTM told Agence France-Presse that “this is undoubtedly a vast underestimate of the total human health impacts.”

Still, the researchers were able to offer some insight into the adverse health impacts—thanks to their repurposing of modeling methods typically used to evaluate the environmental footprint of individual products and technologies.

These methods "are an increasingly important tool to tackle sustainability questions at a much larger scale," study co-author and Exeter professor Xiaoyu Yan said in a statement. "Our study shows that this approach can help uncover the massive impacts of plastics on human health throughout the life cycle. We now need urgent action to reduce the impacts of plastics on the environment and ultimately human health."

Deeney stressed that such action can't be restricted to consumers. As she put it, "Our research shows that the adverse health impacts of plastics stretch far beyond the point at which we buy a plastic product or put plastic items in a recycling bin."

In the US alone, government data suggests that just 5% of plastic waste is recycled annually, according to a Greenpeace report published last month. The advocacy group also noted that only a fifth of the 8.8 million tons of the most commonly produced types of plastics are even recyclable.

"Often the blame is put on us as individual consumers of plastics to solve the problem, but while we all have an important role to play in reducing the use of plastics, our analysis shows systemic change is needed 'from the cradle to the grave' of plastic production, use, and disposal," Deeney said Tuesday. "Much more ambitious action from governments and industry transparency is needed to curb this growing global plastics public health crisis."

The lead author said that the most effective measure is slashing the production of "unnecessary" plastic. She also pointed out that lack of data doesn't just impact studies like this one: "Industry nondisclosure and inconsistent reporting of plastics' chemical composition is severely limiting the ability of life cycle assessments (LCAs) to inform effective policy to protect humans, ecosystems, and the environment."

The study comes after the latest round of global plastics treaty negotiations stalled in August—which environmentalists called an "abject failure" that should be blamed on the Trump administration, Saudi Arabia, and other major governments opposed to curbing production.

"The inability to reach an agreement in Geneva must be a wake-up call for the world: Ending plastic pollution means confronting fossil fuel interests head-on," Greenpeace USA's Graham Forbes said at the time. "The vast majority of governments want a strong agreement, yet a handful of bad actors were allowed to use process to drive such ambition into the ground."

--

Jessica Corbett is a senior editor and staff writer for Common Dreams.

Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.

[Find the web link for this article in the comments]

The magic we rarely stop to see…under our feet and above;)

Back at Badou Primary School; planning our end of year exhibition and preparing our last “sculpture” piece for the school anniversary in the spring! I can’t get enough of the children’s work. Check out the crab and her sexy lashes;p

This week’s 4/5th grade artists learning about the nearby tidal environment and creatures.

Thank you Kayla our volunteer from Australia for your extra hands. Full week at Badou Prinary School…From beach cleanups to learning about tidal habitat and making beautiful art;) Happy Holidays everyone!

Oil pastel rainbow transfer drawings on the topic of tidepools with second graders at Badou Primary School.

Learning new perspectives of Home, from microorganisms to the ocean. Thank you to all attendees, your work was so beautiful! Special shout out to Lydia Ya and Daybreak for the loan of their space and hospitality. Cheers to our volunteers Kayla and Andy!!

Looking forward to seeing you all here at 7pm tonight!

Still prepping and planning away as we get ready for our environmental art education program on the tidepools; at Badou Elementary School, Keelung.

Prepping for our environmental art education program late fall at Badou Primary School. Thank you to intern Kayla for the extra hands;) 準備八斗國小環境教育課。

Our morning was spent at the ocean sustainability fair (士林科教館）supporting friends and schools we collaborate with. We then headed to the “March for Climate” parade by 101 to make some noise. Thank you all for a wonderful day full of warm surprises.