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I read that some teabags have microplastic in them. How can I tell which brands are better?
– Julie Warshawsky
Dear Julie,
Dot is not a coffee drinker. Rather, I love a cuppa, as the Brits say. Did you know, Julie, that the British drink 60 billion cups of tea a year? That’s 900 cups of tea for every man, woman, and child on the Isle. And though I can only trace the Dot Family ancestry loosely to Britain (I hail predominantly from the Irish, lovers of Guinness more than Twinings), I adore selecting which tea I’m in the mood for, love the ritual of plugging in the kettle, delight in choosing a teacup.
There’s a value to our rituals, we’re told. While a habit feels mindless, a ritual is its opposite — imbued with meaning, rich with intention. Zen and the art of tea.
Nowhere in our tea ritual, however, do we want the intrusion of microplastics. A 2019 study performed by scientists at Montreal’s McGill University revealed that a single teabag can release more than 11 billion microplastic and 3 billion nanoplastic particles when steeped in boiling water. A further study at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona confirmed that polymer-based commercial tea bags release millions of nanoplastics and microplastics when infused and, furthermore, outlined the capacity of these particles to be absorbed by human intestinal cells, thus reaching the bloodstream and spreading throughout our bodies. Blimey, Julie! We know just how ubiquitous these particles are, thanks to reader Spencer K, who sought advice from Dot on how to keep microplastics out of our bodies (no easy task!).
Must we abandon our daily tea, Julie? Not at all. Though there are some changes we might make to ensure that as few microplastics as possible make their way into our systems. (And Dot has her own favorite, plastic-free brand, available in Bluedot’s Marketplace.)
What are those changes? Keep reading as Dot spills the tea!
