Nestlé-Danone baby food: up to 54–99 microplastics per gram (Greenpeace/SINTEF data)

Credits: greenpeace.org

Among the various websites I follow on nutrition and health, one brought to my attention a Greenpeace International report analyzed by the SINTEF Ocean laboratory on Nestlé (and Danone) and microplastics. I wouldn’t say I was shocked by the results because it's predictable microplastic contaminations in Nestlé products, considering how much they care about customer health, but the numbers are still impressive.

They tested baby food pouches produced by Nestlé and Danone and found microplastics in all analyzed samples. In Gerber (Nestlé) purees, there are up to 54 microplastic particles per gram, while in Happy Baby Organics up to 99. In practice, a single spoonful can contain around 270 particles in the first case and almost 500 in the second.

Looking at an entire pouch, we are talking about over 5,000 particles per Gerber pouch and more than 11,000 per Happy Baby Organics pouch. We are not talking about plastic in the environment or irrelevant traces, but about food intended for infants being contaminated in this way.

Clearly, the source of contamination is no mystery, it is the packaging itself, those multilayer plastics designed to be “practical”, but which are in direct contact with the food. In some samples, chemical substances linked to plastics also appear, including possible endocrine disruptors.

And one very important thing is that these pouches represent over 37% of the global baby food market. A format that has become standard, pushed and normalized precisely by companies like Nestlé, with advertising that shows how convenient and easy to use it is, at home and outside.

I honestly do not understand how it has become acceptable for baby products within this system to come out with these numbers and continue to be sold as the most convenient and modern choice, why is their sale not immediately stopped? How many diseases will be caused in the future by these products? There is so much talk about microplastics, about how harmful they are, and then nothing is done to stop this mess, but evidently the billions of Nestlé and other companies win over public health, even that of children.

References: https://www.greenpeace.org/international/publication/83101/hidden-risks-of-baby-food-plastic-pouches/