---
title: "A New Danger In the Fish We Eat: Plastics"
date: 2013-01-31T01:31:05Z
modified: 2013-01-31T01:31:05Z
permalink: "https://elizabethyarnell.com/a-new-danger-in-the-fish-we-eat-plastics/"
type: post
status: publish
excerpt: ""
wpid: 2788
categories:
  - Living Naturally
  - Nutrition in the News
tags:
  - English Channel ocean fish
  - fish eating plastic
  - plastic in fish
  - plastic in fish flesh
  - rainbow trout drawing
author: Elizabeth
---

[![Drawing of a rainbow trout.](http://elizabethyarnell.com/WP/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Lilia_trout_artwork_2012-300x232.jpg "Lilia's trout")

](http://elizabethyarnell.com/WP/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Lilia_trout_artwork_2012.jpg)Ok, so this is a picture of a river-dwelling fish, a rainbow trout, not an ocean fish. But it a fish and was drawn by my 8-year old daughter – with a little coaching from her fisherman father.We’ve been warned for years about rising mercury levels in predator fish such as tuna and mahi-mahi, but now they’re identifying a new danger in fish as the oceans become full of plastic debris. It turns out that the fish are eating the plastic garbage and the PCBs and chemicals in the plastics are integrating into the flesh of the fish. About one-third of the [fish in the English Channel are now found to have ingested and integrated plastic](http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-01/21/plastic-in-fish "plastic in ocean fish in the English Channel").

Aaaaggghhh! I can’t stand it!

It makes me want to pull an ostrich move and bury my head in the sand and scream: “_I just don’t want to know!_”

Because, now that I know, it will haunt me.

And the only thing I can do about it is encourage people to recycle their plastics rather than toss them.