February 13, 2025 — Recently, micro plastics in humans are back in the news. Researchers are discovering more micro plastics absorbed into our blood, lungs and brain when compared to years ago. Micro plastics accumulating in human airways including lower portions of the lungs that can induce inflammation, oxidative stress and impaired lung function.
The “poster child” for micro plastic exposure are empty water bottles floating in the ocean or awash on beaches. That is not accurate since there are more prevalent sources of aerial micro plastics. Certainly, empty and abandoned water bottles and other plastic containers are unsightly and can invade the sea life environment. However, such news coverage is misleading since plastic bottle exposure is not the number one suspect for aerial micro plastic absorption into human bodies according to a recent article published by the National Library of Medicine dated January of 2024. Personal care products including single-serve bottled water bottles only represent about 2% of the micro plastic load according to this article.
Instead there are greater sources of micro plastics in the air that we breathe and the same article states “Microplastics are generated from a range of sources, but there are four primary areas that significantly contribute to their proliferation: cosmetics, textiles, single-use plastics, and tires.”
So the sources of micro plastics come from washing plastic polymers in cosmetics off of our faces, washing microfibers off of our clothes, disposing of empty yogurt cups, and driving our cars to work such that the plastic polymers in the tires become airborne. The latter seems to be more suspect when micro plastics are directly inhaled by humans while driving or walking near traffic-clogged roadways. The same article states micro plastics from tires remain in the air for extended periods, depending on wind speed and carrying capacity. Of all of the primary sources of micro plastics, according to the same article, synthetic textiles and tires contribute combine the largest share at over 60% and dust at about 25%. Instead of photos of empty water bottles, the burn out of plastic polymers in rotating tires that wear down on asphalt pavement should be the “poster child” of aerial micro plastic pollution.
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