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The Effects of Ocean Plastic Pollution on Marine Ecology
Summary
This review describes how plastic waste accumulates in the oceans, breaks down into microplastics under sunlight and saltwater, and enters food chains as fish and shellfish mistake particles for food. It summarises the scale of the problem — plastic makes up roughly 70% of ocean pollutants and is linked to the deaths of millions of seabirds and marine animals annually. The paper serves as a broad overview of how ocean plastic pollution threatens marine ecology and, through seafood consumption, human health.
The significant role of plastic in advancing human civilization is indisputable. Plastic products have become an essential part of human lives. On the other hand, discarded plastic products pollute the environment. Most of the plastic products are eventually returned to the environment as plastic wastes. Since plastic wastes are not easily biodegradable, they remain in the environment for a long period of time and pose a threat to the ecosystems. Data indicate that about 79% of the plastic ever produced, came back into the environment as waste. These wasted plastics immediately pollute the land and a substantial part of this eventually flows into the oceans through various routes. Currently, wasted plastic products represent about 70% of the total ocean pollutants and plastic debris have been associated with the deaths of over a million seabirds and about 100,000 marine animals every year. Plastic products are photodegradable and thus with the actions of sunlight and saltwater, ocean plastic debris break down into microplastics. Some of these microplastics resemble plankton, and thus they are being consumed by fish, shellfish, and various other marine organisms, and eventually enter the larger animals through the ocean food chain. Studies indicate that ingested microplastics may have disastrous impacts on marine fauna. Through the consumption of seafood, microplastics may potentially endanger human food safety and pose a threat to human health. Unfortunately, at present, due to lack of sufficient data, it isn’t possible to determine the long-term effects of microplastic exposure on marine organisms or human health.