Putting Our Children at Risk by Filling the World with Plastics

In good conscience, it is hard to ignore the steady stream of scientific publications that tell us we are putting our children at risk by filling the world with plastics. And yet it seems that the convenience and ubiquity of plastics make it hard to resist. A sweeping new review in Lancet Child and Adolescent Health offers this blunt assessment:

“Children face an urgent threat in the form of hazards posed by plastics in the environment.

“Plastic production has rapidly increased, producing substantial exposure to chemicals, microplastics, and nanoplastics in early life. Robust evidence documents the effects of early life exposure to chemicals used in plastic on multiple organ systems, with consequences that extend into adult life.”

Case in Point: BPA Exposure in Turkey

A new paper in the Journal of Food Composition and Analysis offers a case in point. Merve Ekici and Nihan Çakır Biçer conducted the first study to assess dietary exposure to bisphenol A (BPA) in Turkey. Based upon national data about food consumption patterns, they estimated the level of exposure to BPA from food. They found that the estimated mean dietary BPA exposure in all age groups exceeded the tolerable daily intake established by the European Food Safety Agency.

Substantial evidence makes it clear that Bisphenol A is an endocrine disrupting chemical. Among other things, this means that it can trigger weight gain and obesity.

Plastics Are Everywhere

We get it. Giving up plastics is a formidable challenge. A global agreement to curb plastic pollution seems impossibly difficult. But the World Economic Forum tells us that this challenge is becoming an economic necessity.

So honestly, can we not find a way to keep from burying ourselves in plastics? Should there not be an alternative to breathing and absorbing ever more of the endocrine disrupting chemicals that come with them? This would seem to be a modest goal.

Click here for the new paper in Lancet Child and Adolescent Health and here for the new study of BPA from food. For further perspective, click here.

Plastic Waste, photograph by Linganathan Anushan, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

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October 6, 2025