Most whales and sea turtles seem to have plastic in their bodies

Sperm whales

Sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) in Sri Lanka

Tony Wu/NATURE PICTURE LIBRARY/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY

Most sea turtles, whales and fish may have plastic in their bodies. To determine the prevalence of various forms and colours of this material in marine animals, Marga Rivas at the University of Almería in Spain and her team analysed data from 112 studies published in the past decade.

These looked for microplastics, fragments less than 5 millimetres in size, and larger bits of plastic in marine specimens globally.

Of the studies, 80 examined the gastrointestinal tracts of animals to see what they had ingested. The …

source: newscientist.com