this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2024
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[–] slampisko 52 points 8 months ago (4 children)

Makes me genuinely wonder.. I've donated blood for like 15 times now -- does that make my current blood less saturated with microplastics than if I hadn't?

[–] SpaceNoodle 61 points 8 months ago (3 children)

No, because you eat and drink more microplastics to replenish yourself.

[–] BallsandBayonets 50 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Donate 100% of blood, then fast. You'll be microplastic free for the rest of your life!

[–] [email protected] 15 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Live a little will ya.

Keep your blood, eat plastics raw, turn yourself into a 3D printer.

[–] scutiger 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I'm already a 3D printer. I'm not very accurate, and my extrusion width is limited, but my flow rate is pretty good.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Lucky, my nozzle is always clogging

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Step 2 is optional

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

Donation won't eliminate microplastics, but it will probably reduce their levels. (It has been shown to reduce levels of other harmful substances.)

[–] RaoulDook 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I was thinking that a kidney dialysis machine might be able to filter out that stuff from your blood. I think the way those work is your blood goes out a tube into the machine and it filters it before sending it back to you. So you'd need filters in there that are fine enough to catch the microplastics.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I don't think any filtering happens in dialysis, unwanted stuff just diffuses to another solution

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago

Correct. If there are actually micro plastics in your blood, the plastic is likely relatively small compared to a blood cell. Otherwise we would be witnessing a lot more issues with stroke/heart attacks. Any kind of filter small enough to filter out something that small would also filter out blood cells.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

Probably not. Unless they build up in the body somewhere, the amount of microplastics in your blood is determined by how many you consume via inhaled dust, food, and drink compared with how many you flush put via urine and/or fecal material.

If they do build up in the body somewhere, it probably isn't the blood, because blood is already filtered regularly.

[–] Noedel 3 points 8 months ago

I've read that's true for PFAS... It depends on where the microplastics are stored by your body