NEW YORK (Xinhua) — Microplastics are making their way into human brains, with potentially dangerous effects on people’s health and mental acuity, according to a paper published on Monday in Nature Medicine.
“The tiny fragments of plastic are passing the blood-brain barrier and into human brains, and the amount of microplastics in the brain appears to be increasing over time,” said The Washington Post in its report about the finding. “There were 50 per cent more fragments in brains analysed in 2024 than in 2016.”
The scientists also examined the brains of 12 deceased patients diagnosed with dementia, and found that they had three to five times more microplastics than normal brains.
Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic, less than 5 millimeters in size, or smaller than a pencil eraser, that are either manufactured or slough off of plastic objects. Nanoplastics are even smaller, and can be a fraction of the width of a human hair.
In recent years, scientists have realised that many plastic items (plastic bags, water bottles, tires, polyester or synthetic clothing) can shed small fragments or fibers that make their way into air, food and water.
Many of those particles are burrowing deep into the human body. Microplastics have been identified in the liver, placenta, blood, testicles, even certain arteries that lead to the heart.
