Dear Friends,

I am amazed at the amount of plastic that makes its way in and out of my life. I limit my processed foods, buy in bulk and try to store things in glass, but each day I throw out plastic bags that are used for bread, groceries or other products. How about you? Take a day to count the number of bags that make their way in and out of your life and think about the impact it has on the environment and your health.

Did You Know?

• 80% of the plastic and trash that finds its way into our oceans comes from the land. Plastic debris in the ocean doesn't biodegrade. It photodegrades, meaning sunlight and water break it down to smaller and smaller pieces that are mistaken for food by fish, sea birds and marine mammals.
• More than 260 species of marine animals are affected by plastic debris in the ocean, either by ingestion or entanglement.
• There are many dangers involved with bisphenol A and phthalates, two additives commonly used in plastic. BPA makes plastic hard and phthalates make plastic soft. BPA and phthalates are two plastic additives that are known endocrine disruptors.
• Phthalates are not only used to soften plastic, but are also one of the oily substances used in cosmetics, perfumes, and many beauty products.
• According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the average American produces about 4.4 lbs. of garbage every day. That's 29 lbs. per week or 1,600 lbs. per year. The United States produces approximately 220 million tons of garbage each year. This is equivalent to burying more than 82,000 football fields six feet deep in compacted garbage. This amount of trash could fill enough trucks to form a line to the moon.

Learn more at http://www.bagitmovie.com/about_issues.html.  

Join us to see Bag It to learn how your small efforts to reduce your plastic do make a difference! 

Bag It! Is Your Life Too Plastic?  Monday, August 20, 7 - 9 pm - FREE! 

8 Clifford Street, Exeter, NH 03833  

Americans use 60,000 single-use plastic bags every five minutes that we then mindlessly throw away. Our food consumption is a major contributor to single-use disposables like water bottles, coffee cups, plastic utensils and take out containers which make our lives more convenient.  But, after being disposed, plastic containers and water bottles get placed in overflowing landfills, clogged rivers, and our ocean. And when the plastics break down, they do not biodegrade. Instead they break down into fragments that contaminate our natural resources.  

Where do the bags and other plastics end up, and at what cost to our environment, marine life and human health? Bag It follows "everyman" Jeb Berrier as he navigates our plastic world. Jeb is not a radical environmentalist, but an average American who decides to take a closer look at our cultural love affair with plastics. Jeb's journey in this documentary film looks beyond plastic bags and discovers that virtually everything in modern society-from baby bottles, to sports equipment, to dental sealants, to personal care products-is made with plastic or contains potentially harmful chemical additives used in the plastic-making process.To see a trailer of the movie, click here. 

In good health,

Kath & Tracey

www.foodandhealthforum.com 

 See more photos from our past events on our Facebook page at  www.facebook.com/foodandhealthforum