Indian scientist announces dangerous discovery about plastic bags

Indian scientist announces dangerous discovery

An ATIRA scientist announced that he has found a way for plastic bags to become brittle and turn into a fine powder when exposed to sunlight. Leading Indian daily, the Indian Express published an article implying that plastic bags were now “safe!”

ATIRA is the acronym for the Ahmedabad Textile Industry Research Association.

Rajiv Badlani, anti-plastic bag activist and manufacturer or reusable cloth bags said he is “appalled”.

“Until now, innocent animals and marine creatures, who couldn’t differentiate between plastic bags and food swallowed the stuff and died horrible deaths because plastic is indigestible, and full of poisonous toxins” said Badlani, “now, all us humans can also kill ourselves the same way, because that fine plastic powder will mix with the soil we grow our food in and the water we drink”.

He’s written to the editor of the Indian Express and is waiting to see if he takes the trouble to correct the dangerous impression Express readers must have got.

He also phoned the scientist, who admitted that this fine powder would retain all its original chemical properties.

Badlani feels that in a country where millions derive their livelihoods from growing and processing cotton and jute ATIRA ought to be finding ways to make re-usable cloth bags more attractive, rather than researching ways to make plastic even more dangerous than it presently is.

At http://www.badlani.com/bags he says they sell reusable cloth bags every day of the week to customers all over the world, but laments that awareness of the harm that plastic bags do is abysmally low in India.

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Norquest Brands is a small organisation based in Ahmedabad, India, that seeks to offer viable and attractive alternatives to plastic bags, which they consider a serious threat to our planet’s continued good health.