Plastic Pollution Gets Personal

For the first time plastic particles have been found in human blood. A paper published by authors from  Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the open access journal Environment International on March 24 reports measurable levels in the blood of 17 out of 22 healthy volunteers.

The study found polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polyethylene, poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) and polystyrene in blood of healthy volunteers.

The discovery of polypropylene particles between 5 and 10 µm in human placental tissue was widely reported in 2021. The new study finds even smaller particles of four commonly used plastics. And it finds them in the bloodstream where they could interact with the complex machinery of the immune system and be transported to multiple organs.

The main focus of this new work is analytical method development. Pyrolysis, gas chromatography and mass spectrometry can quantify the amount of plastic in the blood (rather than just revealing it is there). Focusing on particles that are at least 700 nm (0.7 μm) in size the authors found two of their 22 volunteers had levels in excess of 10 micrograms of plastic per milliliter of blood – 5 times more plastic in the blood after a dose of aspirin.

Concentrations of plastic particles by polymer type in whole blood samples of 22 donors (duplicates a and b). Figure from “Discovery and quantification of plastic particle pollution in human blood”, Environment International, 107199, March 2022.

We don’t know how long plastics linger in the bloodstream. Nor do we know the fate of these particles in the human body or how much of each of the plastics represents an unhealthy level. These new methods could be used to assess the potential accumulation in the general population and in workers who are regularly exposed. The techniques could support important work investigating correlations between human health effects and different exposure scenarios.