Do you know anyone who likes going to the dentist for a root canal? Neither do we. But, for Emily Lallouz, her root canal quickly turned from ordinarily annoying to quite scary when the hygienist found something unusual in her mouth.
During a routine irrigation after the root canal, Lallouz was asked if she used Crest Pro-Health toothpaste, and she was confused why she was being asked that specific question, she said yes.
That’s when the hygienist showed Lallouz the tiny blue balls that she was removing from underneath her gums and in between her teeth.
These plastic beads (microbeads) are found in the Crest toothpastes, supposedly to enhance the paste’s cleaning abilities.
Instead of being washed away with water, they can get stuck. The beads eventually make their way to open waters, where they are found by fish and often ingested.
With the sheer number of products that contain the bits of plastic, the implications of their usage are scary. The nature of retail being one of constant change, it’s impossible to keep a complete and comprehensive list of products that utilize the microbes. However, here are a few examples of products that use them.
Luckily, the law is catching up to the technology, and states are slowly banning the sale of products that contain them.
As of October 2015, California, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland and New Jersey have all passed pieces of legislation that restrict the usage of microbeads.
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