By this point, we’re not stranger to microplastics, the tiny grains of plastic that are killing our marine life whilst also having detrimental effects on human health.

As plastic waste breaks down in our oceans – with huge amounts of plastic drifting through our waterways into our seas every year, it becomes smaller and smaller bits of plastic. In turn, these tiny bits of plastic float through the water but are less easy to identify as plastic.

When these tiny particles float through the water, they are frequently ingested by sea creatures – either simply through the act of swimming through them, or because they mistake them for tiny food particles. The particles accumulate in the creature’s bodies, which can prove lethal – not only to the individual fish but to the vital marine ecosystems they are a part of.

And with microplastics discovered in the brain, reproductive organs, liver, kidneys, lungs, and even bloodstream of people too, scientists are scrambling to understand the effects of the plastic that is accumulating within us, and how to solve this widespread problem.

The issue is, it’s not just eating seafood that is responsible for our own consumption of microplastics.

Sure, the tiny bits of plastic that have broken down in the ocean and been consumed by fish and other sea creatures is one cause of human microplastic consumption, but that doesn’t account for the number of vegetarians who also have microplastics in their bodies.

Breathing in tiny plastic particles has been acknowledged as another way in which we might absorb the plastics – which our bodies have no way to break down – as is the degradation of plastic items around us.

But a recent article published in the journal Environment and Health has demonstrated a new, more worrying cause for the plastics that enter some of our bodies.

And the cause is something that, ironically, is trying to heal us.

As the research team explain in the article, quite alarmingly, the use of IV drip bags seems to be resulting in the depositing of microplastics in a patient’s bloodstream, where it can be transported anywhere in the body:

“While MPs can be ingested, breathed in, or drank in, a very direct entrance channel is available through ingress into the bloodstream. Intravenous infusion usually proceeds from plastic bottles.”

Despite the fact that the researchers acknowledge that filtering is used to limit contamination of plastic particles into patients’ blood, their study shows the astounding result that a significant number of plastic particles can be observed travelling into the person’s blood using electron microscopy and spectroscopy techniques.

And the quantity is harrowing:

“We found that, after filtering, infusion solutions from PP bottles contain approximately 7500 particles/L. The particles ranged in size from 1 to 62 μm, with ∼90% of particles between 1 and 20 μm in size and ∼60% of the particles in the range 1 to 10 μm.”

While these particles are tiny, they are perhaps more dangerous than the microplastics we ingest by mouth. That’s because these potentially toxic materials are delivered intravenously into our bodies, with the researchers confirming that this direct route to the bloodstream could have severe, negative long-term effects for the patient.

Though the study is alarming, the researchers hope that it draws important attention to the matter, with several precautions – including different filtration methods and further study – recommended.

Alongside reducing single-use plastics and proper recycling measures, this could help safeguard all our health into the future.

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