The Plastics Problem: Inventing and Forgetting Sciences of Synthetic Harms
Pharmaseal advert for plastic tubing from the 1960s.
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At HSS 2026, Jeremy Greene presented ‘The Plastics Problem: Inventing and Forgetting Sciences of Synthetic Harms’ as part of Plastic Amnesias I, chaired by Alice Street.
The presentation returned to 1967, when FDA official Earl Meyers recognised that the promise of inert medical plastics was not holding up. Containers discoloured or dissolved when exposed to some medicines, patients experienced inflammatory reactions, and healthcare professionals raised concerns about plasticisers and stabilisers leaching into the body.
Greene traced how the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association, the Society of the Plastics Industry and the United States Pharmacopeial Convention developed new sciences intended to establish “medical-grade plastics” as safe. Drawing on regulatory and industry archives, he examined how this work was contested by clinicians and consumer groups, and how an earlier recognition of synthetic harms was largely erased following the Medical Device Amendments of 1976.
