Overview
- The peer-reviewed study, published Wednesday in the European Heart Journal, analyzed coronary and peripheral blood from 61 patients undergoing invasive coronary angiography.
- Micro- and nanoplastics were detected in 84% of patients with acute heart attacks, 40% of patients with chronic ischemic disease, and 32% of patients with normal coronary arteries.
- Smoking and higher long-term exposure to fine particulate air pollution (PM2.5) strongly predicted plastic detection, with smokers about six times more likely to have plastics in their blood.
- Polyethylene, a common packaging plastic, was the most frequently identified polymer and heart attack patients showed a greater variety of plastic types than other groups.
- Authors and independent experts stress the findings are associative not causal, point to small sample size and contamination and measurement challenges, and call for larger, standardized and longitudinal studies to test mechanisms and public-health implications.