Microplastic Levels in Human Brains Double Since 2016, Concern Experts

Microplastic Levels in Human Brains Double Since 2016
Microplastic Levels in Human Brains Double Since 2016. Credit | Shutterstock

United States: According to a preprint shared online in May, the autopsy results of human brain samples conducted in 2024 showed a larger amount of small pieces of plastic than appeared in a sample study conducted eight years earlier.

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According to Matthew Campen, the lead author and a regents’ professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, “The concentrations we saw in the brain tissue of normal individuals, who had an average age of around 45 or 50 years old, were 4,800 micrograms per gram, or 0.5% by weight,” as CNN Health reported.

“Compared to autopsy brain samples from 2016, that’s about 50% higher,” Campen said. “That would mean that our brains today are 99.5% brain and the rest is plastic,” he added.

Larger presence of plastic shards

Phoebe Stapleton, an associate professor of pharmacology and toxicology at Rutgers University in Piscataway, New Jersey, who was not part of the study, noted that the rise in the number of plastic shards in the brain only shows exposure but does not provide proper information about brain damage.

She said, “It is unclear if, in life, these particles are fluid, entering and leaving the brain, or if they collect in neurological tissues and promote disease,” as CNN Health reported.

“Further research is needed to understand how the particles may be interacting with the cells and if this has a toxicological consequence,” he continued.

What has the study revealed?

According to the preprint, the brain samples possess seven to thirty times more shards of plastic as compared to samples of cadavers’ kidneys and liver.

Moreover, as per Dr. Philip Landrigan, the pediatrician and biology professor, and director of the Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good and the Global Observatory on Planetary Health at Boston College, “Studies have found these plastics in the human heart, the great blood vessels, the lungs, the liver, the testes, the gastrointestinal tract, and the placenta,” as CNN Health reported.

“It’s important not to scare the hell out of people, because the science in this space is still evolving, and nobody in the year 2024 is going to live without plastic,” he continued.

He said, “I say to people, ‘Listen, there are some plastics that you can’t escape. You’re not going to get a cell phone or a computer that doesn’t contain plastic.’ But do try to minimize your exposure to plastic, such as plastic bags and bottles, that you can avoid.”

What more have the experts reported?

FDA considered the statement by the American Chemistry Council, an industry association, which stated that while “some studies on microplastics have recently garnered headlines,” and “Current scientific evidence does not demonstrate that levels of microplastics or nanoplastics detected in foods pose a risk to human health.”

According to Kimberly Wise White, the council’s vice president of regulatory and scientific affairs, “Research underway not only helps address current data gaps in our understanding of exposure to microplastics, but it also aims to develop improved tools to measure the toxicity of microplastics to humans,” as CNN Health reported.

“This work is important given the unvalidated methods often applied by researchers which can lead to unreliable or misleading outcomes, the complex nature of microplastics, and the many variables that can affect human health,” she continued.