Nailing Down the Health Effects of Microplastics in Our Brains

It’s a fact. We are eating, drinking, and breathing microplastics. They are accumulating in our bodies – even in our brains. It took painstaking work to figure that out, but even more challenging is the task of nailing down the health effects of all those microplastics.

Researchers are doing their best to figure this out.

Delivery of Endocrine Disruptors

Though it is not precisely clear what these microplastics are doing to our health, it is clear enough that they are delivering endocrine disrupting chemicals. In a recent review, Sana Ullah and colleagues explain:

“Microplastics and Nanoplastics absorb and act as a transport medium for harmful chemicals such as bisphenols, phthalates, polybrominated diphenyl ether, polychlorinated biphenyl ether, organotin, perfluorinated compounds, dioxins, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, organic contaminants, and heavy metals, which are commonly used as additives in plastic production.”

This might explain the association that Yun Zhang and colleagues recently reported between evidence of microplastic exposure and major adverse cardiac events. Likewise, last year in the New England Journal of Medicine, Raffaele Marfella et al reported an association between microplastics in carotid artery plaque and major cardiac events.

So, yes, we have good reason to believe that these tiny particles of plastic are not good for us.

Animal Studies, of Course

In the New York Times, Nina Agrawal describes the research of scientists at the University of New Mexico to understand the health effects of microplastics. She describes the tedious work these researchers hope will reveal important insights:

“Teya Garland, a pharmacy student, was beginning that process in the lab. Wearing a mask to avoid inhaling particles, she inserted bits of what looked like colored chalk into a machine that howled eerily as it froze and pulverized the plastics. Eventually, researchers will feed them to mice and study how different levels and types affect their brains and behavior.”

To understand the health harms of microplastics, these animal studies are essential because they can be carefully controlled. From human exposures, all we can hope for is observational data and natural experiments.

Because the plastics industry has enrolled us all – without consent – in an uncontrolled trial of ever increasing doses of microplastics. We would like to opt out, please.

Click here for free access to Agrawal’s reporting, here and here for the recent studies of cardiac events, and here for Ullah’s review. For perspective on the health effects of microplastics from the European Environment Agency, click here.

Plastic Ensemble, assemblage by Giacomo Balla / WikiArt

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April 10, 2025