On February 11, 2022, Louise M. Goodes from the Australia-based Minderoo Foundation and co-authors published a protocol on the pre-print platform medRxiv outlining their planned systematic scoping review. The review aims to investigate human in vivo studies related to exposure from chemicals in plastics. Minderoo plans to review all clinical studies published in English since 1960 on the MEDLINE and EMBASE databases on the topic. Their primary research question concerns “which plastic chemicals/particles and which health domains have (and have not) been investigated” in the medical literature since 1960. Sub-analyses are planned to analyze (i) which populations have been examined, for instance, between different geographic locations, age groups, sexes, and risk status, (ii) which study designs were used, and (iii) when the studies were undertaken.
The review will consider “all avenues of plastics exposure” such as incidental environmental contact, occupational exposure, exposure through food and drink, and ingestion through the placenta and breast milk. According to the authors, their review may help identify research clusters and gaps, and the “findings may be used to strengthen efforts to better regulate the production, importation and use of plastic materials that human populations are ubiquitously exposed to.”
Minderoo Foundation researchers previously published a plastic waste makers index which showed global plastic flows from production through to end of life, and a review of human and planetary health hazards of plastics along the entire plastics life cycle (FPF reported, also here).
Read more
Goodes, L. M. et al. (February, 2022). “A scoping review protocol on in vivo human plastic exposure and health impacts.” medRxiv (in pdf)
