People With IBD Have More Microplastics in Their Feces
upstart writes:
People with IBD have more microplastics in their feces:
The prevalence of IBD [(Inflammatory bowel disease)], which includes Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, is rising globally. [...] Microplastics can cause intestinal inflammation, gut microbiome disturbances and other problems in animal models, so Faming Zhang, Yan Zhang and colleagues wondered if they could also contribute to IBD. As a first step toward finding out, the researchers wanted to compare the levels of microplastics in feces from healthy subjects and people with different severities of IBD.
[...] The microplastics had similar shapes (mostly sheets and fibers) in the two groups, but the IBD feces had more small (less than 50 m) particles. The two most common types of plastic in both groups were polyethylene terephthalate (PET; used in bottles and food containers) and polyamide (PA; found in food packaging and textiles). People with more severe IBD symptoms tended to have higher levels of fecal microplastics. Through a questionnaire, the researchers found that people in both groups who drank bottled water, ate takeaway food and were often exposed to dust had more microplastics in their feces. These results suggest that people with IBD may be exposed to more microplastics in their gastrointestinal tract. However, it's still unclear whether this exposure could cause or contribute to IBD, or whether people with IBD accumulate more fecal microplastics as a result of their disease, the researcher say.
Journal Reference:
Zehua Yan, Yafei Liu, Ting Zhang, et al. Analysis of Microplastics in Human Feces Reveals a Correlation between Fecal Microplastics and Inflammatory Bowel Disease Status, Environmental Science & Technology (DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.1c03924)
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