When a pair ofcontact lensesreach the end of their short life span , it may be alluring to dump them — and the liquid they ’re stored in — down the bathroom go under drainpipe . AsThe Atlanticpoints out , though , this is bad for the environment .
However diminished and slight they may be , contact lens can impart to microplastic pollution in waterways when they ’re not disposed of properly , according to a new study show at the recent American Chemical Society national meeting in Boston . The survey go over contact lens exploiter and non - users , and found that 19 percent of user flush the lens down the toilet or go down drainpipe instead of placing them in the trash . That translates to about 3 billion contact genus Lens per twelvemonth , Rolf Halden , a researcher at Arizona State University and one of the study ’s authors , toldThe Atlantic .
Halden pronounce he was inspire to take care into the issue out of personal interest — he , too , wears contact lens — and because he could n’t find any study on what bump to lenses after they ’re flushed down the drainpipe . Halden and his team discovered that the lenses stop up in wastewater , where they can go under to the bottom because they are denser than urine . There , they could endanger aquatic aliveness , especially bottom feeders that may ingest the particles .
Researchers also found that bug in wastewater treatment plant system can take down the structure of the lenses themselves and break them into tinier art object . In the larger environment , those bits could be consumed by every organism in the local food chain . In addition , some of the crimson lenses are become into a do by sewerage slime that is at last used to fertilise crops , so the wastefulness could end up in our soil and affect creatures like earthworms . The extent to which this affects humans ' solid food supplying is not presently sleep with .
" Ultimately , we hope that manufacturers will conduct more research on how the lenses affect aquatic life and how fast the Lens degrade in a marine environs , ” Halden say in astatement .
So the next fourth dimension you ’re done using your contact genus Lens , think of the Pisces and dirt ball , and give them in the scrap alternatively .
[ h / tThe Atlantic ]
