Microplastics May Be Overcounted

Summary: We hear a lot about microplastics being everywhere, even in our bodies. Documentaries on Netflix make it sound terrifying, adding scary music to make us panic. But scientists at the University of Michigan just found a surprising mistake.

The machines used to count microplastics were actually counting dust from the scientists' own lab gloves! The gloves have a chemical coating that looks exactly like plastic to the testing machines. This doesn't mean microplastics aren't real, but the scary high numbers might just be a simple lab error. It's a great example of scientists double-checking their work and proving that the truth is often less dramatic than a TV show.

For more details, see rssapp-realclearhealth-com at acsh.org/news/2026/04/08/microplastics-may-be-overcounted-heres-why-50050 (opens in new tab)