Aaron Hartman, MDFunctional Medicine Specialist | Clinical Researcher

The Danger of Microplastics (What are Microplastics?)

4 Jul 2024 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:18

This is a short YouTube talk by Aaron Hartman, MD introducing microplastics and nanoplastics, explaining routes of human exposure (inhalation, ingestion), highlighting recent research linking nanoplastics to cardiovascular disease (including detection in carotid artery walls), and noting that average American consumption is about 5 grams of nanoplastics per week. The speaker flags the issue as increasingly recognized and promises to discuss solutions later.

Questions this video answers

About 5 grams per week (equated to a credit-card-sized amount).

About 78% of their carotid arteries were blocked (as stated).

Over half (reported as "over half of them" had nanoplastics in the walls of the arteries).

Chapters

So I'd like to talk about microplastics. What are microplastics and why are they such a big deal? Recently in social media, in the news, these are actually coming to our consciousness that this is actually a really, really big deal. So the concept of microplastics are this, that we're getting exposed to small, small, small particles of plastics called micro or nanoplastics in our environment, and you can actually absorb them through breathing, through things you eat. Now, one thing I've noticed, there's an article attached with this one. This has been under the radar now for about the last five to 10 years we've known about it. But this article actually brings it to light that nanoplastics are a really, really big issue, and they actually may be associated with a significant amount of cardiovascular disease. There's a study quoted here that actually looked at people with blocked carotid arteries. About 78% of their carotid arteries are blocked, and over half of them actually had nanoplastics in the walls of the arteries. So this is like the big smoking gun. Like, oh, my gosh. This is actually a really, really big issue. The caveat to that is exposure to microplastics has been going up the last decade, and as of now, the average American is consuming about 5 grams of nanoplastics a week, which is about the equivalent of a credit card worth of microplastics. That is crazy. We're going to talk, keep on talking about this, giving you all more information, but the very end, we'll actually talk about some solutions to this significant issue that's now coming to consciousness, and we really need to address it. Take care and we'll talk to you soon.