The need for environmentally realistic studies on the health effects of terrestrial microplastics.

ABSTRACT: Plastic pollution is now so widespread that microplastics are regularly detected in biological samples surveyed for their presence. Despite their pervasiveness, very little is known about the effects of microplastics on the health of terrestrial vertebrates. While emerging studies are showing that microplastics represent a potentially serious threat to animal health, data have been limited to in vivo studies on laboratory rodents that were force fed plastics. The extent to which these studies are representative of the conditions that animals and humans might actually experience in the real world is largely unknown. Here, we review 114 papers from the peer-reviewed literature in order to understand how the concentrations and types of microplastics being administered to rodents in lab studie

SUBMITTER: Mills CL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10202987 | biostudies-literature | 2023

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature