Hot coffee in plastic cups may expose drinkers to lakhs of microplastics each year: Study
For a lot of people, a takeaway coffee is automatic. You grab it on the way to work, carry it through meetings, sip while checking messages, then toss the cup without a second thought. It feels harmless. Comforting, even. But researchers are starting to show that this everyday habit may be adding something extra to your coffee that you never asked for. A recent review of studies suggests that drinking about 300 ml of hot coffee every day from a plastic-lined cup could expose someone to nearly 3.6 lakh microplastic particles over the course of a year. The number sounds shocking, but the reason is fairly simple. Heat matters. Hot liquids cause far more microplastics to leach out of plastic surfaces than cold drinks do. Most takeaway cups are not really just paper. They are usually coated on the inside with a thin layer of plastic, often polyethylene, to stop leaks. When hot coffee or tea sits against that lining, tiny plastic particles can shed into the drink. You cannot see them. You ca...
