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Comment by maxqin1 | Hacker News Reader

The focus here is on the environment. However, plastic is linked to many health issues as well.

Plastic packaging makes hygienic food more accessible as an effective and cheap barrier to pathogens, incoming and outgoing. Such public health interests should be balanced against their toxicity. It's easier for wealthier people to substitute with restaurants, servants and higher quality materials. So a general plastic ban would amount to a regressive tax on sanitary food.

Agree that a case by case analysis is appropriate, but I don’t really see any world where the cost/benefit analysis of plastic and water would be anywhere near the same ballpark

Why is this comment downvoted? It seems to be nuanced, or are there some studies showing that this is absurd? I'm genuinly curious

Because of the "dihydrogen monoxide" snark.

Oh that was trolling, didn't pay attention about this part...

That penn and teller episode with the petition for removing dihydrogen monoxide from schools was fantastic.

https://youtu.be/zVxypRWZODQ

Using obscure terminology to confuse people certainly makes a good joke :-) I'm not sure it really tells us much though.

It tells us that people are willing to sign a petition to ban a thing while clearly not having done their research on the thing, just because an authoritative-seeming stranger told them something plausible. It means that such petitions shouldn't be taken seriously; and, to the extent that they are serious, it implies something about people's recklessness with regard to policymaking.

(I wonder how such a survey would fare today, when most people have smartphones with browsers and an internet connection.)

Such as? BPA-free plastics are common.

I mean, we implant plastic medical devices in humans.

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