I remember reading an old SciFi book many years ago (decades?) about the scenario where a rapid plastic eating bacteria gets into the world.

Wish I could remember the name of it, as I roughly remember the book as being pretty good too. :)

Do you mean the Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton [1] (also a movie) and I seem to remember it being a good watch when I last watched though that might be a good 15 years ago. The idea was novel enough it's stuck with me since and I do often joke with people about it, especially given from what I gather that certain types of funghi can now digest certain types of plastic [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Andromeda_Strain

[2] https://www.shroomer.com/mycoremediation-plastic-eating-mush...

Doing some looking around online, I think it was Mutant 59:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0670496626

There's not much info about it on the Amazon page nor Goodreads, but there's a good review of it here:

https://astrofella.wordpress.com/2018/07/27/mutant-59-the-pl...

Nah, it was definitely a different book. Thanks for trying though. :)

> I think this does mean that plastic things could soon rot.

In the presence of moisture, maybe. The are plenty of microorganisms that can break down wood and paper, yet they can still stay intact for centuries.

Time to invent a type of plastic that's poisonous to these bacteria!

> Is it harmful to humans?

> Not at all! You can definitely trust that my company has studied this in depth. I'm sure it isn't going to make it into everyone's bloodstreams before we learn it's actually terrible.

> before we learn it's actually terrible.

Before you learn it's actually terrible if I may.

[Busy covering up the 3000% cancer rates of the production line workers]