Scientists have detected microplastic pollution in human blood for the first time, with the particles found in almost 80 per cent of the people tested, reports the Guardian.
The new Dutch-funded research published in the journal Environment International shows the particles can travel around the body and may lodge in organs, the report said on Thursday.
The impact on health is as yet unknown. But researchers are concerned as microplastics cause damage to human cells in the laboratory and air pollution particles are already known to enter the body and cause millions of early deaths a year.
Huge amounts of plastic waste are dumped in the environment and microplastics now contaminate the entire planet, from the summit of Mount Everest to the deepest oceans. People were already known to consume the tiny particles via food and water as well as breathing them in, and they have been found in the faeces of babies and adults.
The scientists analysed blood samples from 22 anonymous donors, all healthy adults and found plastic particles in 17.
Half the samples contained PET plastic, which is commonly used in drinks bottles, while a third contained polystyrene, used for packaging food and other products.
A quarter of the blood samples contained polyethylene, from which plastic carrier bags are made.
The new research adapted existing techniques to detect and analyse particles as small as 0.0007mm.
Some of the blood samples contained even two or three types of plastic.
The differences might reflect short-term exposure before the blood samples were taken, such as drinking from a plastic-lined coffee cup, or wearing a plastic face mask, he said.
The team used steel syringe needles and glass tubes to avoid contamination. They tested for background levels of microplastics using blank samples.
“Our study is the first indication that we have polymer particles in our blood – it’s a breakthrough result,” the Guardian quoted Prof Dick Vethaak, an ecotoxicologist at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands, as saying. “But we have to extend the research and increase the sample sizes, the number of polymers assessed, etc.” Further studies by a number of groups are already under way, he said.
“It is certainly reasonable to be concerned,” Vethaak told the Guardian. “The particles are there and are transported throughout the body.” He said previous work had shown that microplastics were 10 times higher in the faeces of babies compared with adults and that babies fed with plastic bottles are swallowing millions of microplastic particles a day.
“We also know in general that babies and young children are more vulnerable to chemical and particle exposure,” he said. “That worries me a lot.”
