Obama signs bill to ban microbeads

Say goodbye to the beads.

On Monday, Dec. 28, President Barack Obama signed into law a ban on tiny plastic particles used in personal cosmetic products that scientists say are polluting U.S. lakes, rivers and the oceans.

The bipartisan "Microbead-Free Waters Act of 2015," (H.R. 1321), passed by the U.S. House on Dec. 7, "prohibits the manufacture and introduction into interstate commerce of rinse-off cosmetics containing intentionally-added plastic microbeads."

The tiny plastic beads, about the size of a pen-tip, have been shown to filter through municipal wastewater treatment plants after consumers rinse them down the drain while using soaps, toothpaste and other products that contain them.

The concern is that pollutants can attach to the floating plastic, which enters the food chain when fish and wildlife mistake the tiny beads as edible.

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