Toxic plastic pollution is everywhere, even clogged arteries. We asked a Colorado doctor how to stay healthy.
Toxic plastic pollution is everywhere, even clogged arteries. We asked a Colorado doctor how to stay healthy.
A new study has found tiny pieces of plastic we use everyday can find its way into the plaques of clogged coronary arteries. We asked a Colorado physician for tips on how to protect our health, despite these tiny particles being practically unavoidable.
Micro- and nano-scopic sized pieces of plastic people use everyday can eventually find its way into the most unlikely of places, even in the plaque of clogged arteries of cardiac patients, a recent study found.
"If microplastics might be promoting coronary disease, you might not be able to avoid ingesting the microplastics, because they're everywhere, but you can sure do the other things. You can keep your blood pressure low. You can exercise. You can get your cholesterol measured," Gerber said.
It says the plastic pollution in the clogged arteries are toxic, is that true? It was my understanding that they don't actually know what effect the plastics have on the body, and people just assume the effects are bad (not unreasonably).
Yes, specifically compounds that leach out of the plastic. This has been known for several years. Here's a recent article that goes over some of the things that leach out and the problems they create https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0048969723062939 Follow the citations for more details.
Thank you for the article, it looks like there is a lot in the way of getting a clear picture of how much plastic additives and their leaching impact health, but I do think plastic additives have been clearly shown to be toxic and bad for the health. I always feel it is ironic when "BPA-free" is used as marketing, as it isn't disclosed what other additives they might be adding to that particular plastic, even if it doesn't use BPA (or whether the plastic even would have had BPA in the first place).
That's what this study from last March says (see link in the description):
A total of 304 patients were enrolled in the study, and 257 completed a mean (±SD) follow-up of 33.7±6.9 months. Polyethylene was detected in carotid artery plaque of 150 patients (58.4%), with a mean level of 21.7±24.5 μg per milligram of plaque; 31 patients (12.1%) also had measurable amounts of polyvinyl chloride (...)
This just shows the plastic is found in the arterial plaque,
not that the plastic has a toxic effect on the body.EDIT: The article in question did find a correlation with the presence of microplastics in the plaque and worse health outcomes compared to those without microplastics detected in their plaque:
In this study, patients with carotid artery plaque in which MNPs were detected had a higher risk of a composite of myocardial infarction, stroke, or death from any cause at 34 months of follow-up than those in whom MNPs were not detected.
I totally could be wrong, but I thought when they discover microplastics cause some kind of health condition that would be huge news.
Searching around, I found this article talking about the known toxic effects of additives like BPA: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7920297/
But I don't think that demonstrates the toxicity of microplastics accumulating in the body.
This article had more promising citations to follow-up on: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics_effects_on_human_health
Some plastics can leach chemicals which can have toxic effects on the body.
But overall this question is silly. "Toxic" can be defined as "capable of causing injury or death, especially by chemical means; poisonous". So even if it's not necessarily chemically or poisonously bad for the body, clogged arteries can cause injury and death via heart attacks and or strokes regardless of what is clogging them. So unless someone is trying to argue that microplastics found in the clog didn't help contribute to the clog to any degree it's clearly having a bad effect on the body.
So this is like trying to debate if a stainless steel knife found in someone's heart could have had a "toxic" effect on their body.
So unless someone is trying to argue that microplastics found in the clog didn’t help contribute to the clog to any degree it’s clearly having a bad effect on the body.
Yes, I would assume that the presence of the microplastics in the plaque is not contributing significantly to the accumulation of the plaque or the development of the heart disease, since it is the plaque accumulation that causes the heart disease and the presence of microplastics is more like the presence of other bioaccumulators in higher-trophic organisms (like vitamin B12, mercury, or strontium-90).
I do agree this is like talking about the toxicity of the stainless steel of the knife found in someone's heart - clearly the problem here isn't the material of the knife and whether it is toxic, but the fact that someone was stabbed. Likewise, the problem is the accumulation of the plaque and the heart disease that follows - the focus on the microplastics is irrelevant except that it is concerning if we later find out microplastics are causing disease.
The only reason I'm focusing on whether the microplastics are indeed toxic or not is because that is a big claim, and if found to be true would be really big news. It sounds like that hasn't been demonstrated yet, though I want to look at the link zero_spelled_with_an_ecks sent, it looks like the article talks about leaching from microplastics that may have more clear health impacts.
I don't mean to be nit-picking, in university classes professors have discussed microplastics like in the context of agriculture and food-supply and my professors basically said the science is not out yet about what the effects of microplastics are, even if everyone felt they were probably bad there wasn't evidence yet as to how they were bad. I couldn't tell if the headline was implying there was a breakthrough in the science, and looking now it just seems like there hasn't been one and it's just more of the general sentiment that plastics are probably bad.
Was the answer yoga? 🤣