Plastic ‘Microbeads’ From Cosmetics Showing Up In Great Lakes Fish

Tiny beads of plastic from cosmetics and other consumer products are showing up in the Great Lakes, prompting scientists’ worry about potential harm to both fish and humans.

The “microbeads” supposedly make body scrubs clean better. The bits of plastic are also in some cosmetics and toothpaste. Wastewater treatment plants, however, have trouble filtering out the beads, and the plastic winds up in surface waters.

UW-Superior chemistry Professor Lorena Rios has been collecting samples of the plastic from the Great Lakes. She says the tiny beads eventually get into fish.

“They eat it, and retain it in the stomach,” she said, “and you can see how the fish can have some tumors or another situation in the body.”

Rios says it isn’t clear if the cancerous tumors are just caused by the plastic, or by other water pollutants. She also says there’s a chance humans will absorb the beads if they eat the fish.

Several Great Lakes states, though not Wisconsin, are considering bans on the microbeads, and some cosmetics manufacturers are voluntarily phasing out the plastic.

Tyson Cook of the environmental group Clean Wisconsin, meanwhile, urges people to avoid products with microbeads.

“If customers go out and they look at the ingredients list of their face scrubs and their body scrubs and their toothpaste, and they consciously avoid buying anything that says ‘microbeads,’ that says ‘polyethylene’ or ‘polypropylene,’” Cook said, “we can really reduce demand for these products and reduce the amount that gets out into the environment.”

Cook says there are many other products that don’t use the plastic. He says the microbeads don’t biodegrade, and could continue to be a pollutant for some time.