Protecting Children from the Perils of Plastic: The People’s Pharmacy Podcast

Transcript Joe Graedon (00:00:00): I’m Joe Graedon. Terry Graedon (00:00:01): And I’m Terry Graedon. Joe Graedon (00:00:02): Welcome to this podcast of The People’s Pharmacy. Terry Graedon (00:00:02): You can find previous podcasts and more information on a range of health topics at peoplespharmacy.com. Joe Graedon (00:00:13): Where would we be without plastic? Parents rely on plastic pacifiers, plastic toys, and plastic bike helmets. This is The People’s Pharmacy with Terry and Joe Graedon. Terry Graedon (00:00:27): Plastics are incredibly convenient, lightweight, and unbreakable. They make great food containers. Now they’re everywhere, including in us. Is that a problem? Joe Graedon (00:00:45): Young people have more plastic in their bodies relative to their size than older folks. Terry Graedon (00:00:50): One major source of plastic is ultra-processed food. Microscopic particles of plastic are often embedded in the food and are also in the packaging. Can busy parents feed their kids without relying on ultra-processed food? Joe Graedon (00:01:05): Coming up on The People’s Pharmacy, protecting children from the perils of plastic. Terry Graedon (00:01:14): In The People’s Pharmacy Health Headlines: Doctors could predict women’s risk of heart disease decades in advance if they use three common blood tests. Research published in the New England Journal of Medicine demonstrates that inflammation and a blood lipid called lipoprotein A are critical, along with LDL cholesterol. Researchers analyzed high-sensitivity CRP, LDL cholesterol, and LP-little a levels in the 1990s for nearly 30,000 participants of the Women’s Health Study. Thirty years later, these healthy, middle-aged women had experienced more than 3,600 cardiovascular events. People with the highest levels of CRP were 70% more likely to have had one. High levels of LDL cholesterol increased the risk by 36%, while women with high levels of LP little a were 33% more likely to have had a heart attack or stroke. Terry Graedon (00:02:16): When there’s a history of heart attacks in families, often lipoprotein A levels are high. It’s estimated that about 30% of the world’s population has elevated levels of LP little a. Many physicians believe that diet has no impact on this biomarker. Joe Graedon (00:02:38): A new study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition reveals, however, that eating more saturated fat lowers LP little a levels modestly. Carbohydrates, on the other hand, raise LP little a levels. Terry Graedon (00:02:52): Of course, this research completely contradicts the usual dietary advice for controlling heart disease risk. Diet can also lower C-reactive protein, which is a measure of inflammation. Anti-inflammatory foods include dark green leafy vegetables, blueberries, flaxseed, and cocoa. Joe Graedon (00:03:11): The European Society of Cardiology has just updated its guidelines for treating high blood pressure. Hypertension in Europe is now defined as 140 over 90, but there’s a new category. Doctors are encouraged to treat elevated blood pressure higher than 120 over 70. Terry Graedon (00:03:32): This is a major change from previous European guidelines. Physicians there are being urged to start treatment with lifestyle changes such as exercise and diet. If that does not lower blood pressure adequately, they’ll be expected to prescribe antihypertensive medications. Exceptions are made for patients who get dizzy when they stand up or those over 85 years of age. Joe Graedon (00:03:55): Patients with a history of cancer are rarely given advice about diet. Data from the UK Biobank showed that individuals who ate the most ultra-processed foods were 17% more likely to die and 22% more likely to die from cancer than those who ate the least. Terry Graedon (00:04:23): This was based on records of almost 14,000 volunteers with a history of cancer. The median follow-up was more than 10 years. The authors conclude, quote, “Current research results support the recommendation for individuals with a history of cancer to consume unprocessed or minimally processed foods, such as fruits and vegetables.” Joe Graedon (00:04:38): Medications such as Enbrel, Humira, and Remicade work in part by blocking the action of the inflammatory compound called tumor necrosis factor, or TNF. These drugs are used to treat conditions like rheumatoid arthritis or psoriatic arthritis. Terry Graedon (00:04:54): A systematic review of 15 randomized trials of green tea found that this natural compound significantly reduced circulating levels of TNF in people with metabolic syndrome. Joe Graedon (00:05:08): Plastic is ubiquitous in our environment. Now, scientists report that autopsies show micro- and nanoplastic particles in our brains. Terry Graedon (00:05:11): Even worse, these tiny shards of plastic are increasing over time. The researchers compared autopsy data gathered in 2016 to tissue samples gathered in 2024. Levels of micro- and nanoplastics are now roughly 50% higher than they were eight years ago. Joe Graedon (00:05:38): The researchers note that the amount of plastic particles in brain samples was 7 to 30 times higher than that seen in livers or kidneys. They conclude that plastic appears to accumulate selectively in brain tissue, which could be worrisome as global rates of dementia continue to rise. Terry Graedon (00:05:57): And that’s the health news from The People’s Pharmacy this week. Terry Graedon (00:06:18): Plastic has been around for a little more than a century. The original compound, Bakelite, was employed as an electrical insulator. Joe Graedon (00:06:21): Today, plastic material is ubiquitous. We use it in buildings, cars, pipes, bottles, and packaging, to name just a few of the many places plastic appears in modern life. Terry Graedon (00:06:40): But plastic is showing up in us as well. Micro- and nanoplastic particles are found in the blood and organs of humans in increasing concentrations. Joe Graedon (00:06:49): To help us better understand the implications of plastic on human biology, we turn to The People’s Pharmacy pediatrician. Terry Graedon (00:06:58): Dr. Alan Greene is the founder of DrGreene.com, the pioneer physician website. He’s founding president of the Society for Participatory Medicine and author of Feeding Baby Green and From First Kicks to First Steps. His first children’s book, Flower Moon, was published in 2023. Joe Graedon (00:07:13): Welcome back to The People’s Pharmacy, Dr. Alan Greene. Dr. Alan Greene (00:07:20): Terry, I can’t tell you how happy I am to be back on The People’s Pharmacy with you and Joe. Terry Graedon (00:07:23): Well, Dr. Greene, we have to tell you, it is always a joy to speak with you. And we are now excited to talk to you about something that has been worrying us for almost, if you can believe it, 50 years. I’ll never forget the movie The Graduate. Joe Graedon (00:07:34): Yes. Terry Graedon (00:07:34): And Dustin Hoffman was told just one word: plastics. It was the wave of the future. Dr. Alan Greene (00:07:47): And now it’s the wave of the disaster. Terry Graedon (00:07:48): Can you tell us about the problems of plastic, especially for children, and not just those plasticizers, the BPA and the bisphenols and the phthalates, but the microparticles of plastic and what they’re doing to us, especially our kids? Dr. Alan Greene (00:08:02): You’re right. The Graduate was so on point. Plastics were huge, just like they predicted. Back in 1906, when there was an earthquake in San Francisco, there were zero synthetic plastics in the world. There were zero synthetic plastics in the soil, in the water, in the air, in animals, in the ice in Antarctica. There were zero. But in 1907, synthetic plastics were invented and introduced into our environment. And then they really took off in World War II. And then they really took off after that because they’re so convenient in so many ways and inexpensive. But as a result, little bits of broken-down plastics, a micron in size, a nanometer in size, maybe five millimeters in size—these shards are showing up literally everywhere. They’re in our soil, in our food, in our water, in so many products that we use in our lives every day and every corner of the environment, including in Antarctica. Terry Graedon (00:09:21): Where are they coming from? Dr. Alan Greene (00:09:34): So the plastics were manufactured to last. But they last in a way that they slowly break down into little pieces. Then they get into our body. And the question is, they’ve been found in multiple places in our bodies. We now know that there are microplastics or nanoplastics, these little shards that are present in our kidneys and that are present in our livers and that are present in our brains. Just in 2024, there was a study out of New Mexico showing that microplastics were in every single placenta that was studied. And then just in May 2024, in every human testicle that was studied. Dog testicles too, but they were much, much higher in human testicles. Joe Graedon (00:10:22): And what are they doing in our testicles? Because it seems like that’s not a good place, especially given that they’re endocrine disruptors. Dr. Alan Greene (00:10:38): So up until recently, there hasn’t been a clear-cut answer to that. Back in 2005, I was the physician on a study with the Environmental Working Group where we measured umbilical cord samples to see what chemicals were there. We found 287 different chemicals, industrial chemicals, in baby’s blood at the moment of birth. And in their umbilical cord, they’ve been coursing through their bodies while they were developing before birth, including plastic ingredients and byproducts. But we didn’t know what that meant. We do know in this study in May, looking at shards of plastic and testicles of dogs, the higher the level of plastics, the lower the sperm count of the dog. And this makes sense. We’ve known for a while that phthalates, one of the plasticizers used to make plastics softer, does lower sperm count and sperm concentration. And we’re headed for a bit of a disaster in that regard. From the time my dad was born until 1990, male sperm counts dropped from 113 million per milliliter to 66, almost in half. Not enough that that meant most people were having problems with fertility. Usually, you have to drop down to about 48 was the number I learned in med school for that to become an issue with male fertility. But right now in the U.S., we’ve just dropped to a sperm concentration of 47. Terry Graedon (00:12:12): Dr. Greene, that sounds a lot like The Handmaid’s Tale. Dr. Alan Greene (00:12:15): It sounds a lot like The Handmaid’s Tale. Margaret Atwood was prescient in a lot of ways. Terry Graedon (00:12:20): Now, we’ve been talking about the effect of microplastic particles, which have been seen in both dog testes and human testes. And we’ve been talking about the effects on reproductive health for men. What about the effects on reproductive health for women? And do we have micro pieces of plastic in our bodies, too? And are they having an impact? Dr. Alan Greene (00:12:36): We definitely have them in males and females, both in reproductive organs and almost everywhere there we look in the body. We still don’t know the impact of this brand-new experiment. Really, up until 2024, one would say that there is means, motive, and opportunity for plastics to be able to cause problems. But there hadn’t been a real clear-cut link to the problems of these new materials in different places in our body. But that changed when there was a big article, a big study that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine, where they looked at coronary artery plaques on people that had a problem in the coronary arteries. It was severe enough that they needed to have surgery. And they went and measured to look at how much plastic was there, to see if plastics, little plastic shards that they could see under the microscope, made a difference in the outcomes. And a few things. One, they found that about 60% of the plaques that they identified did have plastics in them. Most of them did have plastics in them. And oddly, the amount of plastic was higher the younger the person was. Same thing, sadly, was found in the testicles of men. The younger the person, the more likely they were to have increased plastics. So the thought was that since these folks were younger with the higher levels of plastics, perhaps they would have a better outcome. But they followed them for three years, and they found that those who had the microplastics in the plaque in their artery were four and a half times more likely to have stroke, heart attack, or death within 34 months. Four and a half times more. Terry Graedon (00:15:18): Dr. Greene, I’m wondering, as you tell me that younger people have more plastic particles in their bodies, I’m thinking, well, the amount of plastic in our environment has been steadily increasing. Old people like Joe and me, who were born in the 1940s, we weren’t overexposed to plastics when we were very young, when we were children. But people who have been born in the 1990s, the 2000s, the 2010s, plastic is just kind of ubiquitous, isn’t it? Dr. Alan Greene (00:15:56): It’s everywhere. And our exposure to plastics is doubling about every 10 to 15 years and still going up. So yeah, it is the young who are at the highest risk from this. Joe Graedon (00:16:21): So the question is, how does the plastic get into our body in the first place? Dr. Alan Greene (00:16:26): And there’s lots of ways. We know it does come in some when we inhale it. It’s in the air. It does come in some through personal care products that go on our skin, and that’s important to try to avoid phthalates in your personal care products. But far and away, the big way is when we directly put the plastic into our body through what we eat and what we drink primarily. And there was an interesting study this year done up in Toronto where they were looking at plastic levels in foods. This was primarily proteins because often the thinking was that because seafood is in the ocean where there’s lots of microplastics now that maybe they’ll have the highest level compared to maybe cows are different and maybe tofu is different and maybe seafood and maybe poultry is different. Joe Graedon (00:17:16): And what, among all the protein sources, which ones have the highest levels of microplastics? Dr. Alan Greene (00:17:21): And it turned out differently than they expected. It turned out that the type of protein made very little difference. What made a difference was how processed the food was. So back in 2009 in Brazil, they came up with a study called NOVA rankings of ultra-processed food. And level one means the food is the way you would find it in nature. Joe Graedon (00:20:15): When we say plastic is ubiquitous, it really is. Plastic is found not just in the obvious places, like water bottles, backpacks, and flip-flops, but also in us. Studies have found teensy plastic particles in our brains, livers, and coronary arteries. Terry Graedon (00:20:27): Young people have more plastic inside them relative to their size than older folks. How can parents protect their children from the perils of plastic? Joe Graedon (00:20:38): We’re talking with Dr. Alan Greene, a pediatrician in private practice. Dr. Greene is the founder of DrGreene.com, a pioneering physician website. He also founded La Connexion and was the founding president of the Society for Participatory Medicine. He’s the author of Feeding Baby Green, Raising Baby Green, and From First Kicks to First Steps. He published his first children’s book, Flower Moon, in 2023. Terry Graedon (00:21:14): Dr. Greene, you’re saying that the type of protein in this study didn’t make nearly as much difference as how processed it was. Can you tell us more about that, please? Dr. Alan Greene (00:21:26): Yeah, this was a dramatic finding. And back in 2009 in Brazil, they came up with this rating for how processed food is. It’s called the NOVA Classification. And Class 1 is food the way you’d find it in nature, like an apple or a carrot or something like that, an ingredient you would find growing from the land or from the water. Level 2 are other ingredients that you would find in a kitchen, like a home kitchen or even a restaurant kitchen. Level 3 are things that are made in a factory but made from real foods. And then Level 4 are things that are primarily the main ingredients are factory-made ingredients. And it could be an extrusion or a chemical or an emulsifier or whatever it is, or artificial color, flavor, preservative. And those are ultra-processed. Joe Graedon (00:22:20): Well, Alan, I’m going to interrupt you because we can talk about this in an abstract way. Terry Graedon (00:22:28): Yeah. Joe Graedon (00:22:29): People want to know, well, what precisely are you talking about when it comes to foods? And I think for the most part, it’s all that stuff that’s in a bag or a box. Terry Graedon (00:22:36): Right. Joe Graedon (00:22:36): And it’s in the middle of the supermarket. So let’s just name some things that equal ultra-processed because I think, you know, a lot of us just go, oh, chips, no biggie. You know, chips are great. They go well with guacamole. You know, cheese and crackers, not a problem. What do you mean when you say ultra-processed foods, especially when it comes to children? So just give us some examples, please. Dr. Alan Greene (00:23:01): So it matters how the food is prepared. So for instance, a chocolate chip cookie that’s made at home with flour and butter and real ingredients is entirely different. That would be like a level two than a chocolate chip cookie that you buy in a package made in a factory with artificial and chemical ingredients.