Hassan Abbasi
Mass production of plastic began in 1950, with a production of only 2 million tons, and in 2021 it reached 375 million tons, 187 times the production of 1950. Plastic production in the year of the capitalist crisis of 2008 decreased by about 4% compared to the previous year, but this decrease, like all capital production, was temporary, with production reaching 335 million tons in 2016. The world also saw a 0.3% decline in production of this commodity in 2020, but in 2021 it grew by 2.2% to 375 million tons. Global annual plastic production has been increasing continuously and has doubled over the past 15 years, from 230 million tons in 2009 to 288 million tons in 2012. Production reached about 311 million tons of plastic in 2014, and this figure rose to 360 million tons in 2018. It takes 400 years for plastic, such as a plastic bag, to decompose in nature. This means that the masses of plastic that capitalism produces and is released into nature are accumulating. Research in the first study in 2015 shows that of the total global plastic production, its consumption, and its fate, the accumulation of plastic in the world reached 9.2 billion tons by 2017 over nearly 70 years. The amount of plastic remaining in nature (after reducing its amount, such as by incineration) is expected to reach 12 billion tons by 2050. But this figure is very optimistic, because despite all the deafening clamour of capital governments, the recovery of this commodity in 2019, its best year, only reached a meager 9 percent of that year’s production (368 million tons). The United Nations says nearly 80 percent of all plastic produced ends up in landfills. The organization said in a report in mid-2018 that five trillion plastic bags are used worldwide each year, equivalent to 10 million plastic bags every minute. Only 9 percent of all plastic produced in 2019 was recycled, 12 percent was incinerated, while the majority, 79 percent (6.5 billion tons), remains on land and in the sea.
Microplastics (MPs) are among the most persistent environmental contaminants due to their widespread presence in water, soil, food, beverages, and biological tissues. Annually, millions of tons of plastic waste degrade into micro-sized particles (5 mm to 1 μm) through physical, chemical, and biological processes. MPs pose significant risks to humans, animals, and plants, with confirmed presence in human biological samples such as breast milk, feces, urine, and semen. These particles have been linked to respiratory disorders, inflammation, cellular damage, metabolic disturbances, and reproductive dysfunction. Compared to other materials such as wood, metal and glass, plastic is a relatively young material that began its development in the middle of the 20th century. Now this capital good, which is almost as much as all types of metals and minerals, is produced with various purposes and applications, from synthetic fibers, softeners, durable parts for ship hulls, aircraft, automobiles to similar goods made from other capital raw materials.
Environmental pollution due to microplastics (MPs), heavy metals (HMs), pesticides, personal care products, pharmaceuticals, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and others has been a rising concern in recent years. Among others, MPs (plastic particles < 5 mm) are the most significant pollutants found in soils and water as a result of their growing production and consumption in the 21st century. Annually, over 400 million tons of plastic are manufactured, of which over 93 % ends up as waste. MPs are generated when plastic pollution, mostly in the form of packaging materials, is discharged into the environment and decomposes as a result of physical, chemical, and biological processes. MPs are therefore widespread across the land, freshwater, sea], and air, penetrate the food chain, and pose significant risks to both humans and animals. There have also been reports of MPs detected in the human body, including the lungs, the respiratory tract, the placenta, blood, and feces. Consequently, MPs can have a number of adverse effects on human health, including DNA damage, oxidative stress, organ malfunction, neurotoxicity, metabolic disorders, immunological response, and toxicity to reproduction and development. Due to their toxicity, endurance, and bioaccumulative nature, PMs pose a serious environmental threat. MPs are frequently classified based on their origin, size, shape, and chemical compositions. Numerous studies have proven that MPs’ toxicity is directly correlated with their size, with smaller MPs being more harmful to the environment. MPs occur in a wide variety of sizes, with particle sizes ranging from 1 μm up to 5 mm. In a similar manner, the shapes of MPs have also been linked to their adverse effects. MPs are present in a variety of shapes in the environment.
Commodities are inherently perishable, but capital in all areas of production has tried, and has been successful to some extent, not only to increase their useful life but also to increase their flexibility by using techniques and materials. It is in this direction that production processes are made flexible by using various types of plastics and increase the speed of production. Many plastics with their flexibility, impermeability and indestructibility have wide applications in various production processes. The longer goods spoil, the more resistant they are to heat, pressure, and chemical reactions, the wider the market they will find. Plastics have all the necessary properties in these areas. Capital, however, creates a mass of goods based on the need for accumulation and scale of production, not on the needs that must be met, because these needs are created in the process of production and the development of capitalism. This means that capital also creates goods and with it their capital and personal consumption needs, and in all this process the driving force is the accumulation of capital on a larger scale. The foundation of capital’s work is based on the production of maximum goods by minimum labour, the extreme reduction of the cost of various components of the fixed capital sector, the highest possible quality of goods, and the maximum competitive power in the capitalist market. Capital appreciation is the determining goal and driving force of capitalist production relations. When production institutions start producing a certain commodity, they ignore the type of health and biological abnormalities and their severity and the dangers they bring to humans, animals and nature. Therefore, the opening of each new area of capital advance arises from the requirements of capital accumulation, and as long as these requirements exist, the new area continues to expand.
According to statistics, global plastic production is projected to reach 445.25 million metric tons in 2025 (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2213343725038965)
Regardless of whether a country is developed or developing, microplastics remain one of the major problems in many countries, from China to the United States. MPs are present in numerous sources, including textile products, plastic bottles, fishing nets, lipsticks, masks, creams, and other personal care products. Tests on bottled water from major companies have shown that almost all of them contain tiny plastic particles. In the largest study of its kind, 250 bottles purchased in nine different countries were tested. On average, there were 10 plastic particles per Liter of water, each of which is wider than a human hair in diameter (more than 100 microns) – very small plastic particles (microplastics). Particles smaller than 100 microns (a micron is one thousandth of a millimetre) were much more numerous than those larger than 100 microns, averaging 314 particles per liter. In addition, microplastics, which are less than five millimetres in diameter, are used in many cosmetics, hygiene and laundry products. Clothing made from synthetic fibers produces a large portion of the world’s microplastics. Research on MPs in human-derived samples was enhanced in 2019, once nine distinct MPs were found in human fecal samples. Through dietary, dermal, and inhalation exposure, recent studies have demonstrated the accumulation of MPs in a number of vital life-sustaining tissues, such as the lungs, kidneys, liver, gastrointestinal system, placenta, reproductive system, brain, and human amniotic fluid. The accumulation of MPs in the human body has been connected to a number of detrimental health consequences. Acute and chronic exposure to MPs in humans and animals can induce various molecular pathways. Researchers worldwide have detected MPs in various environmental media, including food, water, soil, and air. Major sources of MP pollution include plastic bottles, bags, construction materials, personal care products, and textiles. Over time, environmental weathering causes plastic waste to break down into MPs. Among all ecosystems, soil has emerged as the most heavily contaminated with microplastics.
About 60 percent of clothing is made from synthetic wool and down, and the trend of using cheap synthetic yarns has been growing. According to the results of a new study in 2018, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a mass of floating plastic between Hawaii and California, now covers more than 960,000 square meters, equivalent to 58 percent of the area of Iran. The massive plastic debris is estimated to contain 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic and weigh about 88,000 tons, the equivalent of 500 large airplanes. The new figures for the volume and weight of the debris are 16 times higher than previous estimates. Since then, the plastic debris has been expanding, and similar findings have been seen in other oceans around the world. Plastic production has increased by 200% in the past 20 years, and it is predicted that by 2050, the amount of plastic in the oceans (known as plastic fish) will exceed the number of actual marine creatures. What is more important is the accumulation of this dangerous commodity in nature for all living things. Some types of plastic have a lifespan of several hundred years. Microplastics are also created through the breakdown of plastic waste, abrasion, and washing clothes and cars. The tiny blue beads found in hygiene products such as toothpaste, face wash, or body wash are actually tiny plastic beads used to scrub and remove dirt. Microplastics not only pollute rivers and seas, but millions of people ingest them every day through tap water. Research in the United States, examining more than 150 samples of tap water from several cities on five continents, concluded that 83 percent of the samples contained microscopic plastic fibers. Car tires and street and road markings are also other sources of microplastics. According to statistics from the International Union for Conservation of Nature in 2017, car tires (with 28 percent), synthetic fiber fabrics (with 35 percent) and urban dust (with 24 percent) are the largest contributors to the production of microplastics. Plastic is now found in the form of ordinary pebbles. Research shows that tiny pieces of plastic debris found on the seashore bear an uncanny resemblance to beach pebbles. Plastic pollution has reached the highest peaks and deepest valleys on Earth. These tiny pieces of plastic, called pyroclastics, are created either by heating plastic as part of the manufacturing process or by melting plastic pieces in the environment through unknown processes. This plastic waste then oxidizes or erodes when it hits sand and seawater like rocks, releasing microplastics. Because these plastics look so much like pebbles, they may have been hidden from the eyes of the world. The result of this process is microplastic and nano plastic particles that have been found in food, food containers, including plastic drinking water bottles. The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) warned on January 19, 2022, that plastic pollution is an urgent global problem that requires a serious UN treaty to solve. The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) argues in its report that plastic pollution is almost equivalent to the problem of climate change. The relevant organization, which has a huge budget, does not mention in its report, like other international organizations of capitalist governments, any reference or source whatsoever to introduce what it calls the “climate change problem.” But this same organization knows very well and clearly that this is not a problem of the capital cycle, because plastic production, like the entirety of capital, only creates profits for capitalists, and the problem of change is something else. In short, this is a problem of the billions of workers in the world, who must find a solution for it themselves! The organization emphasizes in its report that the air we breathe now contains very small plastic particles, and that plastic particles have found their way into soil, food, and even the Arctic ice cap. For example, it is reported that about 20 elephants in Thailand died after eating plastic-laden garbage at a landfill. The report’s authors urge countries to agree to a UN treaty with binding targets to reduce plastic production and disposal. “If this growing tide of rampant pollution continues, by 2040 the amount of plastic dumped in the oceans could exceed the weight of all fish in the oceans,” said Tom Gammage of the Environmental Research Institute.
The United Nations has identified “climate change,” “biodiversity loss,” and “pollution” as three existential threats to the environment, concluding that they must be addressed together. Multilateral agreements to combat biodiversity loss and climate change have been in place for nearly 30 years, but they have not been effective in halting carbon dioxide emissions or protecting the natural world. The idea of a treaty to tackle plastic pollution has faced opposition from some countries in recent years. But more than 100 countries, including Britain, are said to be backing the proposal, which is due to be tabled at the next UN Environment Assembly in February and March. Then-US President Joe Biden said his country would support a global agreement, while former President Donald Trump opposed it. However, it is unclear whether he will be able to convince Congress, as most plastics are made from oil and gas, which the country produces. Japan is said to be trying to limit the scope of such an agreement. Gulf Arab states and China have also remained silent so far. China is the largest producer of “virgin plastics” (plastics made for the first time from petroleum). However, the US and the UK are said to be the biggest producers of plastic waste per capita. “The visible nature of plastic pollution has raised serious public concern, but the vast majority of plastic pollution is invisible,” Mr Gammage said when the report was released. “The damage caused by the overproduction of virgin plastic is irreparable – it threatens human civilisation and the fundamental ability of the planet to maintain a habitable environment.” “The risk it poses is becoming almost as serious as climate change.” Richard Thompson, a senior plastics expert at the University of Plymouth, told the BBC that the UN treaty should focus on the full life cycle of plastics. “The underlying problem is rooted in the unsustainability of production and consumption,” he said. “Supporting policies that only encourage the use of ‘recyclable’ plastics will not be effective unless there is a local infrastructure for effective collection, separation, and recycling of these plastics.” It seems that asset managers, government officials, and influential think tanks at financial institutions are concerned that plastic pollution is becoming the second largest environmental pollutant.
But this big lie has been told by them many times in all cases of environmental destruction by capital against us, the working masses. What they are concerned about is stopping, disrupting and questioning, however insignificant, the production of capital, and in this specific case the production of plastic. The process of capital circulation and capital production is the most sacred foundation of this system, and no worker has the right to question it. A worker is a human being who sells his labour power, and by selling his labour power, he is exempted from interfering in determining the fate of his own production and life. Capitalist governments are the guardians of this system, and they tell us workers that the right to interfere in the sacred affairs of production belongs to the capitalists, the capitalist state, and the capitalist parliament. If you want to say something about this, start creating unions and unions, parties and dissolving all kinds of parties in opposition, start environmental cleaning groups and groups, and in short, provide the tools to dissolve the working-class power as widely as possible!! At the same time, environmental destruction is disrupting the lives of the world’s workers every day, creating diseases and killing. In this way, our class war has challenged the workers. But the class war power of the working masses is manifested and exercised only in their organized, Council, nationwide, anti-capitalist movement. This power cannot be aligned in any other container. The fate of the world working class is tied to how to get out of this impasse. A challenge that, if won, could have the widest possible impact on the entire world labour movement. We must take the fate of life, work and production into our own hands. We must emerge from this impasse, the pitiful subjugation of the working masses, from the failure to recognize the history-making power of our class struggle and the feeling of helplessness in organizing an anti-capitalist and nationwide council of this power. Without breaking this barrier, the working class is unable to do anything important and is the target of all the black, catastrophic scenarios of history. Our war may be won or it may be lost, but even the defeat of this war will be the cornerstone of the future victory of the proletariat.
Let’s take a look at some of the latest achievements of the capitalistic murderous system.
On March 23, 2022, researchers found microplastics in human blood for the first time. They report in the journal Environment International that eight out of ten subjects had microplastics in their blood. Dick Wettak, professor of ecotoxicology at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, says there is reason to be concerned. The key question is what happens in the body. Do the particles stay in the body? Do they travel to specific organs, for example through the blood-brain barrier? And are the levels high enough to cause disease? The study is based on the analysis of blood samples from 22 anonymous donors, all healthy adults. Microplastics were found in the blood of 17 of them. Half of the blood samples contained PET plastic, which is used to make plastic bottles, in total particles of Polyethylene terephthalate, polyethylene and polymers of styrene (polystyrene, expanded polystyrene, acetonitrile butadiene styrene etc.), polymethyl methyl acrylate. A third of the particles found contained polystyrene, which is used to make plastic bags. The researchers used technology that allows them to detect particles 0.0007 millimetres (700 nanometres) or larger in human blood. The study is published in the journal Environment International.
Food and drink: Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic that are up to five millimetres in size. They are used in cosmetics and as raw materials in the plastics industry, but they are also formed when larger plastic products are crushed. Microplastics are scattered all over the world and have even been found on the top of Mount Everest. It is well known that humans ingest microplastics through food and drink. According to one study, the average person ingests 50,000 microplastics per year. In this study of a small group of blood donors, the average total measurable concentration of plastic particles in the blood was 1.6 micrograms per millilitre, the first measurement of the mass concentration of the polymer component of plastic in human blood. The study also shows that plastic particles are fully capable of being absorbed into the human bloodstream.
Now let’s return to our previous discussion, let’s return to the fact that until we workers take our destiny, the history-making power of our class struggle, what we produce into our own hands, capital will continue to create darker scenarios for us. Capital will create an escape from the “second pollution of the environment” for circulation and profit-making. The important law of capitalist economy is that the more these relations of production develop and expand, the less they can survive by retaining the tools and methods of their past work. The inventions and discoveries of capitalism are only a flash of the internal compulsion of capital to relentlessly develop technique and industry and other necessities of increasing the productivity of labour. The invention of plastics, like other materials, is one of these. The astronomical speed of the use of these materials necessitated the need for capital, just as the introduction of industrial machinery in production once required an increase in production volume and the use of more raw materials and a wider range of raw and auxiliary materials, which in turn led to the further development of the division of labour at the level of society and within the factory, and the further improvement of labour productivity, creating new environmental conditions within the factory and in the fields of production, society, and nature. Just as there is no end to the use of machinery, there is no end to capital’s need for what is in the path of its production. Therefore, capital finds an escape from the plastic spillage in nature, the environment and our lives to generate profit, increase the intensity of capital circulation, discover and create new areas of capital advance. A look at what the capital institutes are proposing immediately after the “second environmental pollution” plan is not how to stop the wheel of plastic production (in fact, the wheel of capital production), but on the contrary, how it turns this disaster into an ornament for capital, humanizing it and its naturalism! In none of the scenarios explained in the diagram below is there even talk of stopping production, not only in this area, but this amount of capital, like in other areas, must continue to accumulate.
Figure 16 Annual rates of plastic pollution input into the environment estimated from 300 Monte Carlo simulations. (A) Time series of plastic pollution input into aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems (million metric tons per year ± 95% CI) by scenario, between 2016 and 2040, are different scenarios.
The scenarios are Business as Usual (BAU), Collection and Disposal Scenario (CDS), Recycling Scenario (RES), Reduction and Replacement Scenario (RSS), and Plastic Pollution Rate System Change (SCS). The plastic pollution rate for all scenarios is the same between 2016 and 2020. The black dot estimate in 2040 represents the annual plastic pollution rate assuming that global commitments to reduce plastic use and increase recycling announced from June 2019 are implemented through 2040. No time series is provided for this scenario because the timing of implementation is unknown. (B) Estimated density of plastic pollution (million metric tons) in 2040 based on each scenario.
Researchers from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand reported in June 2022 that they had collected samples from 19 locations in Antarctica for the first time, all of which contained microplastics. These tiny plastic particles were found in freshly fallen snow in Antarctica. Microplastics are dispersed by the erosion of plastic products and range in size from invisible particles to something smaller than a grain of rice. The researchers found an average of 29 plastic particles per Liter of melted snow. They identified 13 different types of plastic, the most common of which was PET (polyethylene terephthalate), which is used in the production of plastic bottles and clothing. It was found in 79 percent of the samples. It is the most durable type of plastic, remaining unchanged in nature for hundreds of years. Previous studies have found microplastic contamination in Antarctic sea ice and surface waters, but this is the first time plastic has been seen in fresh snow. A large study published last year in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that microplastics are spreading across the Earth, often carried by dust, wind and ocean currents. Researchers found tiny plastic particles near Mount Everest in 2020. They have also been found deep in the ocean. Microplastics can carry harmful substances that stick to their surfaces, such as heavy metals and algae. They could be a way for harmful species to reach remote and sensitive areas that they otherwise wouldn’t reach. Experts also say that humans inhale and absorb tiny plastic particles through air, water and food. A study by Hull York Medical School and the University of Hull published last year found that ingesting large amounts of microplastics could have potentially harmful effects, such as cell death and allergic reactions. Snowfields, polar ice caps and glaciers around the world are already melting at a rapid rate, and scientists say dark microplastics deposited there could accelerate the process by absorbing more light and heat. These white surfaces, naturally unpolluted, reflect a large portion of sunlight, but other pollutants, such as soot, have also been found on them, which are said to accelerate the melting of snow and ice. Glaciers in parts of the world that are melting rapidly are becoming an increasingly dangerous source of danger, triggering landslides, avalanches and the overflowing of mountain lakes.
The history of capitalism, from its beginning to its end, has been and will be a history of the most horrific distortions, fabrications, and deceptions, but it can be said with confidence that what this group is weaving and trying to feed the working masses is, if not the most catastrophic form of capitalist brainwashing, then certainly the most ridiculous. From the first distortion to the last, the above scenarios collect and recover what capital, and its daily production wheel throws out and pollutes the environment of humans and animals. The capitalist statesmen are determined to announce to the working masses that there is not and will not be the slightest disruption in the process of capital circulation, profit production by the workers and capital accumulation. What is needed is the creation of new areas of profit and capital production through the creation of purification centers!! Now how, where and with what means and techniques is this going to be done, while the producers and industrial centers are scattered all over the world and the products of personal consumption and capital have been scattered in all parts of the world and in the most remote villages for 70 years. To the same extent that large industries have advanced in the field of exploration and extraction of minerals, raw and auxiliary materials for the production of various types of plastics, the dimensions of the destructive environment of humans, animals and nature have also expanded. This means that the causes of environmental destruction and the working conditions of the working class should not be sought in some secondary and superficial side effects of capitalist production, but the roots of all this, including deadly diseases and the daily killing of thousands of workers around the world, should be explored in the capitalist relations of production themselves. The forms of these disasters may have varied and changed throughout the history of capitalism, but they all stem from the same source. They are all the product of the existence of capital and the natural laws of profit-making in this mode of production. An important difference has certainly occurred. Today, especially given the global nature of capitalist production relations, the environmental destruction of this system also breaks all national borders and takes on catastrophic international dimensions. To the extent that capital is global and capitalism has become global, its pests are also global and do not recognize national borders, and to the extent that capital grows, the pressure of its pests and destructions also comes to an even greater degree on humans and nature. In this article, an attempt has been made to open up some corners of these destructions and pollutions using the documents and evidence at hand to enlighten the minds of the workers.
While plastic is visible in nature on beaches and in the sea, microplastics and chemicals, many of which are extremely dangerous to human health, animals and nature, are invisible. A new study shows that rainwater in most places on Earth contains levels of chemicals that are “far above” the safe levels for living organisms. These synthetic chemicals are called PFAS, short for polyfluoroalkyl and perfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), and are used in non-stick pans, fire-fighting foam, and waterproof clothing. Known as “persistent chemicals,” these synthetic chemicals persist in the environment for years. They are now so prevalent that researchers say there is no safe place on Earth to avoid them. Researchers at Stockholm University say that PFASs pose far greater health risks than previously thought, including cancer. There have been growing concerns about the spread of these persistent chemicals in recent years. There are about 4,500 types of these substances, which are fluorine compounds, and they are found almost everywhere on Earth in hundreds of everyday products, including food packaging, non-stick cookware, rain gear, adhesives, paper, and paints. Safety concerns have also been raised about the presence of these persistent chemicals in drinking water. Earlier this year, research in the UK found that PFAS were present in water samples at levels exceeding the safety levels set by Europe. The new study, which looked at four specific chemicals in the group, found that levels of one PFAS chemical in rainwater around the world were often “far above” the levels previously set. Evidence suggests that soil is similarly contaminated around the world. Based on their findings, the authors of the study conclude that this contamination no longer knows any boundaries across the planet, meaning there is no safe place on Earth to avoid these substances. “Our argument here is that we are already beyond the safe operating range, because we now have these chemicals everywhere, and the existing safety recommendations are no longer achievable,” says Professor Ian Cousins, lead author of the study at Stockholm University. “I’m not saying we’re all going to die from the effects of this pollution,” he explains. “But we are now in a situation where you can’t live anywhere on the planet and be sure that the environment there is safe from these chemicals.” While this is undoubtedly a cause for concern, there are caveats. Many of these existing safety levels are advisory, meaning they are not legally enforceable. There has been a lot of research into the health risks of PFAS, with scientists saying that high levels of exposure may be linked to an increased risk of some cancers, fertility problems and stunted growth in children. Professor Crispin Halsall, of Lancaster University in the UK, said: “The levels of these chemicals in the rain are already above environmental quality standards. This means that over time, we will have statistics showing that these chemicals are having a significant impact on human health.” Professor Halsall, who was not involved in the Stockholm University research, added: “And how will the impact of these increased chemicals manifest itself? I’m not sure, but it will become clear over time, because we will exceed the concentration level that is harmful to our health, and their presence in drinking water will expose people to it.” Removing the chemicals in question from drinking water in treatment plants is possible, but expensive. But getting below the U.S. recommended level is challenging, the study authors said. While scientists have learned more about PFAS over the past 25 years, the recommended safety levels have steadily fallen. This has also happened to the levels of chemicals in soil, which is also causing problems. In 2018, the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure set new limits on the concentration of PFAS in soil and dredged material. But this led to the halt of 70 percent of construction projects that involved moving soil or using excavated materials. After protests, the government relaxed the guidelines. According to the new research, this kind of safety degradation is likely to happen with water pollution as well. “If you apply these guidelines everywhere, you can’t build anywhere,” says Professor Cousins. “I think they’ll do the same with the US drinking water recommendations, because they’re just not practical to enforce,” he explains: “It’s not because there’s something wrong with the risk assessment. It’s just because you can’t apply these guidelines. From an economic point of view, it’s impossible to apply any of these guidelines.” The authors of the study say “the key challenge with these chemicals is their persistence, not just their toxicity. While manufacturers phased out some of the harmful PFASs two decades ago, they remain in the air, water and soil. One-way PFASs cycle through the environment is in the form of tiny particles that enter the sea and are carried; these particles are carried into the air and then return to land. As Professor Halsall recently wrote in a report, the inability of PFASs to break down in the environment means they are now found even in remote areas of Antarctica”.