While researchers have yet to find evidence that proves plastic pollution is bad for your health, it’s probably because there have been no human trials.
Researchers have found plastic in almost every corner of the human body, from our brains and poop to blood and testicles (at least it’s not making our stomachs crunch yet). Is this plastic contamination bad for us?
While the answer to that question might seem like a no-brainer—and certainly no one is crazy enough to theorize that microplastics in breast milk are a good thing—there haven’t been any human trials to confirm that microplastics are detrimental to human health. Some research has simply linked microplastics to health complications, which isn’t nearly definitive enough.
So what are we waiting for? To be clear, it’s not simply a matter of getting it done. To understand how or if micro- and nanoplastics (MNPs) are toxic for human health, we first need to quantify and analyze their concentration and composition in samples from living organisms.
