Water is essential for all life. Not only is it necessary for staying alive but in today's society almost everything depends on water. Water is necessary for things such as plumbing and bathing. Water is used for pleasure, such as in alcoholic beverages, and in sports, such as swimming. This list goes on as to why the world needs water, but the humans, which need water the most, pollute it, destroying the most crucial resource. The amount of pollution in the oceans is truly revolting when one realizes how crucial it is for life. Although people may assume that ocean pollution only affects marine life, it actually affects humans as well as their surroundings.
One of the main causes of pollution in water is the many toxins taht are discarded there. Records show that 850 million meters cubed of liquid and solid wastes have been dumped into the ocean in the past 85 years. (Ocean Dumping, 51) In addition to this, debris enters oceans during natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, volcanoes, and fires. (Hepple) Oil is another serious and potentially deadly source of ocean pollution. Oil is almost constantly being spilled into the sea, mostly from non-accidental sources. Some of the greater sources respectively include down the drain, up in smoke, natural seeps, big spills, and offshore drilling. There are many procedures used to clean up oil spilled in marine environments: chemical dispersants to break down the oil into small droplets; oil can be combusted via scorching; oil can be mechanically removed; oil can be washed off the shoreline using hoses; and oil can be skimmed off the top of the water. All of these procedures further damage marine ecosystems and sometimes increase the amount of time required for ecosystems to recover from the oil spill (Foster et al. 1990). The chemical dispersants used to break down oil are toxic (Judson et al. 2010), and the combination of oil and dispersant can have stronger negative effects on marine species than the oil alone (George 1961).
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The many toxins plaguing the water have a pronounced effect on marine life. Marine mammals such as dolphins, seals, whales and sea otters are killed by the many oil spills that plague the ocean. The damage done to these animals can take different forms. The blowholes of dolphins holes are sometimes covered by oil making it hard to breathe and communicate. The oil also coats the fur of seals and otters leaving them to the frigid temperatures and leaving them with hypothermia. When animals eat infected fish and marine creatures, they die or experience other problems. Another issue that many species of marine life are affected by is debris, and as much as 80 percent is plastic. It is estimated that 4 to almost 12 million tons of plastic are dumped in the ocean each year. (J.R Jambeck) Turtles, Fish, Birds, and other creatures become caught in plastics which causes suffocation and drowning.
Pollution effects animals severyely but how does it affect humans? When an animal swallows plastic you expect it to only affect the animal. This is not true. The small pieces of plastic affects not only the animals but the humans who later eat them. Plastics take hundreds of years to decompose and some of them break down much quicker into tiny particles, which in turn end up in the seafood we eat. Oil spills also affect humans in multiple ways. When an animal becomes covered in oil, when it cleans itself it will swallow the oil. Though oil isn’t always immediately lethal, it will cause long-term harm. This harm goes down the food chain, affecting humans that may eat the sea creatures. Humans can also be affected through inhalation or through direct contact. inhalation of oil vapours can have on a human. “In terms of physical health, direct contact with crude oil, or indirect contact through, for example, inhalation of vapors or consumption of tainted seafood can cause deleterious health effects ranging from dizziness and nausea to certain types of cancers and issues with the central nervous system” (Jenssen 1996). Oil spills also have an impact on the economic activities of the people that depend on the sea for a livelihood. The very livelihood of fishers is threatened when oil tankers spill.
Water polllution also has an affect on the water humans drink. In fact, it caused 1.8 million deaths in 2015, according to a study published in The Lancet. Waer that is contaminated cna make humans severly ill. Every single year, contaminated water causes about 1 billion people to be sick. People in low income communities are more likely to be at risk since they live closest to the polluting industries. There are many diseases that are soread through water. “Bacterial, viral and parasitic diseases like typhoid, cholera, encephalitis, poliomyelitis, hepatitis, skin infection and gastrointestinal are spreading through polluted water.”
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