The Truth About BPA-Free: Microplastics, Hormone Disruptors & Baby Bottle Risks | Dr. Robin Mesnage - Live Well Be Well with Sarah Ann Macklin | Health, Lifestyle, Nutrition

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
I've read a lot about microplastics being found in
human placentas in the brain. There's so many different fear
mongering headlines now about that we're slowly becoming
plastic inside and out. If I make a blood test right now
on you, I'm sure I would find hundreds of chemicals which are
circulating in your blood. Sometimes it's even chemicals
which have been banned 40 years.You will find grams of plastics

(00:23):
inside because this is an accumulation of the consequence
of our lifestyle. Robin, tell everyone here you
are. Yeah, I'm Robin Minaj.
I'm a toxicologist. I'm a scientist working on how
lifestyle can impact us. But now I'm trying also to find
solutions. Guess we don't actually know the
impacts of what it's having in our bodies right now.
If you look at the people who have dementia, they are

(00:44):
generally higher quantities of microplastic in their brain
because it's causing inflammation and then it will
make people more sick. You just spoke about there
something that's really interesting that you see written
on a lot of these kind of plastic products, which is like
EPA free. Can you first of all explain
like what that is? This phenol ABPA.
This is a molecule which is usedin plastics as a plasticizer.

(01:05):
This is very small. Are they really as safe as we
think they are? It was developed to be a
contraceptive pill. It was mimicking estrogen
hormones and decades later, industries still choose to make
it into plastics, into our everyday life, knowing that it
has this effect. When you have a baby bottle,
which is DPA, a three, this is not safe.

(01:26):
It's better to have a glass bottle.
What do you think the biggest form of ingestion of
microplastics is that we can tryand reduce?
There's a lot we can do for ourselves 1st and also in the
future. I like to take this example
because this is also where you can act easily.
Firstly, I want to say thank youto tuning in and listening to

(01:47):
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(02:07):
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(02:27):
me reach the goal that I've set for the show of 2025.
Thank you. About 5 months ago, my mum sent
me a message on WhatsApp on a study and a huge piece in the
newspaper about micro plastics and your name was the person who
wrote it. So I immediately reached out to
you. And so I'm thrilled to have a
conversation today on something that is so essential that we're

(02:51):
all talking about and it's on microplastics.
So before I get into microplastics, what they are,
where the research is currently,actually what people are quite
scared of, Robin, just tell everyone who you are and why
we're here today. Yeah, I'm Robin Minaj.
I'm a toxicologist. I'm a scientist working on how

(03:13):
lifestyle can impact us. And so this is the pollution,
microplastics, plastics, pesticides.
I've looked at so many toxic chemicals, but also I didn't
look just at problems. But now I'm trying also to find
solutions. So how the life you have
nutrition, fasting, sleep, emotional have can also be

(03:36):
improved so that you live healthy and happy.
And so this is really the my line of research is to try to
find the problem but also solutions in the how the
environment impacts us. But environment is not just the
chemicals and the approximate environment, but also like how

(03:58):
we eat and how we live. And why did you find this?
Like, obviously it's a very specific area of research.
And what was it that drew you into this?
I was always interested by the effect of the environment, and
1st I wanted to work more in theecology part, to try to save
wildlife and climate and so on, like dreams when I was younger.

(04:20):
And then I just by chance met a professor at the University of
Corn, France, where I lived and worked, and he was working on
the effects of pesticide, Professor Seralini.
And I really got interested by this because I discovered that
basically this is affecting everyone.

(04:40):
This is making us sick, and no one talks about it or very
little. And it's because this is a
pollution you don't see. You can't act on it very easily.
And so this is neglected. And so I decided that I should
work on this topic because thereis so much to be done to raise
awareness and discover like how we can really improve the

(05:02):
regulation for pesticides, to besafer for people to be protected
from pesticides. That's really how I I started my
career. Well, I think it is.
I mean pesticides. Saying that, I think what we
would definitely delve into nearthe end of this episode and I, I
want to start microplastics because it's definitely having a
moment. And I think there is a part

(05:22):
where people are now too afraid to consume so many different
things. And I also think that is also
not very healthy. So I really want to dial it down
today. And I want to start by, you
know, saying that I've read a lot about microplastics being
found in human placentas in the brain in during egg retrieval.
Like there's so many different fear mongering headlines now

(05:43):
about that we're slowly becomingplastic inside and out.
And so when I think about that, it does scare me.
I wanted to first start by asking like, what are
microplastics? How would you define them and
how are they making our way so quickly into our bodies?
Yeah, it what you said remind meof a citation that people say

(06:05):
that we are made of Stardust. But actually nowadays we are
more made of plastics. And it is clear that when you
look at it, there are some studies claiming, oh, there's
microplastics in brains and microplastic in the liver
everywhere. And actually this is more
difficult to find a place where there's no microplastic.
And this is really a problem because nowadays in our brain,

(06:28):
in every tissue, there's grams of plastic.
And these are coming from our lifestyle, from clothing, from
our diet. Everything is wrapped in
plastic, made made of plastic. And so you have these
microplastics, which are particles of plastics that can
be shedded from larger plastics,from a bottle of water for

(06:50):
instance. They have different sizes.
Some are bigger than others and some which are very tiny.
They even look like hormones andcan act like hormones and really
interfere with our health on thelong term.
And these microplastics which are really of like different
types and different size, they mix also with other chemicals

(07:14):
which are everywhere in our environment.
We talk about medication residues, we talk about heavy
metal flame retardants, and it makes that like we are exposed
to 10s of thousands of chemicals.
If I make a blood test right nowon you, I'm sure I would find
hundreds of chemicals which are circulating in your blood.
And everyone is like that. And it's because sometimes it's

(07:37):
even chemicals which have been banned since 40 years.
And because the bio accumulates,they really are persistence.
They don't degrade. We are just dragging all this
pollution which accumulates in our bodies.
And This is why then, when you are making an autopsy of someone
who dies at the age of 80, you look at the brain, you look at

(08:01):
the liver, you look at reproductive organs, you will
find grams of plastics inside because this is an accumulation
of the consequence of our lifestyle.
It's quite scary when we think about it in that way.
I mean, I guess we, I mean, maybe we do tell me if I'm
wrong. I guess we don't actually know
the impacts of what it's having in our bodies right now.
We just know that it's kind of lodged there.

(08:21):
For many of them, yes. We don't know the larger ones.
We know that they will create inflammation and that actually
there's good studies on this because if you look at the
microplastics which are accumulated in the brain, if you
look at the people who have dementia, they have generally
higher quantities of microplastic in their brain

(08:43):
because it's causing inflammation.
And then it will make people more sick and more prone to have
some disease. Same in the heart, in the blood
vessels. If there's more microplastics,
there's more inflammation. You are more at risk of having
some cardiovascular issues. So there's a lot we don't know,
but there's also a lot we know about these microplastics.

(09:06):
And then there's not just the microplastic, but the
nanoplastics, the one which are smaller.
And these ones we really know well what they do because it's
clear that they are interfering with our hormones and they can
make us sick on the long term. So let's say we know the tip of
the iceberg, but we know enough to act if we wanted to really
change our exposure. So they're the endocrine

(09:27):
disruptors that you're talking about, which is really related
to our hormone system. Well, I don't know if you saw
recently the French study that came out.
I mean, Grey, I'm speaking to a French man here, but the French
that came out, did you see that recently that made headlines?
Which one you mean? There's quite a few.
So this is the one that was by the National Food Safety Agency
and they found. So this was what really

(09:48):
surprised me. And this is not to scare people
because I, I mean, I have a water filter at home that I've
put in under my sink now. But when I'm out, I mean, I
always take my water bottle withme in my stainless steel water
bottle. One, just because it's cheaper,
but two, also because I'm not having to buy plastic bottles
when I'm out. But the National Food Standard

(10:08):
Safety Agency found that drinks in glass bottles actually
contain more micro plastics thanthose in plastic or metal.
And the reason for this is that they trace the source back to
the paint on the caps of these glass bottles.
And when the caps rub or get scratched, tiny plastic
particles can leach into the drink.

(10:31):
So I think, you know, a conscious consumer, and that's
most of all that listened to this podcast, would probably
have their own stainless steel water bottle.
Or they would say, I'm actively probably going to make a choice
of buying a glass bottle if I'm in an airport rather than a
plastic one because for me, it'll probably have less micro
plastics. Now, I know that I'm not saying
that that is 100% true. This is one study.

(10:52):
And I think we have to be reallyaware of that.
We can't just say, OK, well then100% glass bottles are worse
than than plastics. You know, that's a very
reductionist view. But it really surprised me that
I thought, wow, OK, in this study it showed that they
actually were worse. Yeah, I was also very surprised
by this study and I looked at what they were testing and it's
clear that it was a large range of bottles.

(11:15):
I would not rush to the conclusion that I would
completely switch from glass bottle to plastic bottles,
because we really know that the impact of plastic bottles are
worse. But it clearly indicates at
least that manufacturers have todo something to avoid this and
that also more testing have to be done.

(11:35):
Because I think that it was really an extract of the French
market and it doesn't maybe represent every type of bottles
because a glass bottle can have different types of cap,
different types of paint. And so we need to understand
more. But it's it's always the same.
It's always a thinking that our products are safe, but then

(11:56):
there's always something that you realize that it is not safe.
And yeah, this is really an interesting study and it's clear
that everyone has been saying inmyself, you have to take glass
bottles because they are safer. And until you realize that maybe
they are not as safe. And I guess in this case, it's
also the fact of not drinking also too many of like sodas and

(12:24):
because it was also mostly in this type of bottles because
also they are a bit acidic and so it can really attack the cap
and release microplastics. So someone drinking water in
glass bottle. I would not tell the person to
switch back to plastic because of this study, but this is
clearly alarming. Yeah, and I do want people to

(12:44):
not fear this. I think this is a bigger
conversation just to give more context.
You know, it's so very ubiquitous in our in our lives
now, micro plastics. And actually interestingly,
we're talking about water bottles because it's probably
the first thing that I think about.
But actually, if we look at the context of things, when I was
thinking about this of where arewe getting it from?

(13:05):
I had washing machines was a bigplace that we get micro plastics
from, which really surprised me.Our tea bags, like the things
that we're putting in every day.As you said, the clothes that
we're wearing, a lot of gym clothes are made from synthetic
fibres, not natural fibres. So it's just these thought
mechanisms. I think that maybe when we stop
and really think about it, like how much this is in our lives

(13:26):
and we can't escape it, this is the thing I think we'd have to
kind of go, OK, what active choices can I make in my life?
But one thing that I found really interesting and I and I
really wanted to share is the IVdrip market at the moment is
increasing. A lot of people are getting Ivs
and I find this in a way quite funny because most people that

(13:47):
invest in IV drips, it's expensive.
So it's a certain type of personthat wants to really invest.
And I have put in quotations. If you're listening to this on
audio, you're not seeing me do this.
But optimize their lifestyle, right?
Optimize their health and tweaking it.
Well, I was like, well, I wonderlike what the interesting
research is there because actually I was thinking about an
IV drip is mostly made from plastic.

(14:09):
And so it made me want to look at the research very quickly.
And I say this because people are going in there because
they're actively wanting to makesure that they're doing
everything they can for their health to be in the best top 1%.
And then I thought, well, wait, they're just putting plastic
into their arm. And so an interesting study I
saw is that a 250 millilitre saline bag has about 7500

(14:33):
particles per bag of plastic andthat figure spikes to 25,000 if
you're being emitted for dehydration or 52,500 in surgery
using multiple bags. And that study was published in
the Environment and Health and it basically was polypropylene.
Am I saying that right, microplastics.
And I thought this is really interesting because the amount

(14:55):
of people now that are getting drips for NAD Plus or all of
these extra boosters that peopleare getting, well, they're also
then just putting more micro plastics into their body.
And if someone's having two litres of water, I think I read
every day, which is the standardfrom a plastic bottle, they're
getting around 3300 micro plastics a year just from

(15:16):
bottles. When you're putting it in that
context, you're getting one drip.
You're getting a lot more from one session than just from
drinking water bottles every day.
Yeah, it's clear. And these 1% of people who are
doing this, they generally are not aware about this
environmental health concern andmicroplastics.
But it's clear that the the problem is larger because all of

(15:36):
this is wide scale use of plastics in hospital.
And it's clear that sometimes when you are in a hospital, you
get more intoxicated at the exits than at the entrance
because it's the food you eat ina hospital.
It's these plastics which are everywhere.
And there have been some studiesas at clearly when you are in a

(15:58):
hospital, you are getting intoxicated, like you said, by
microplastics, but also by endocrine disruptors.
And this really has a lot of effect because when you are, for
instance, drinking from a plastic cup, which is meant made
of plastic or sometimes also like made of cardboard, but
people don't realize that there's plastic lining inside.

(16:19):
You are drinking a lot of microplastics and also endocrine
disruptors. There's Bisphenol A inside this.
And there are some studies showing that if you do that two
hours later, you can see a surgein blood pressure.
It has a really strong effect onthe body straight away immediate
and maybe these are not even themost worrying because effects

(16:40):
which are the most worrying are the long term effect because
this is the cumulative exposure which at the end of your life
making you sick. What do you think?
For general everyday person, thebiggest form of ingestion of
microplastics is that we can tryand reduce quite quickly.
This is in the kitchen that everything happens because I
think 2nd place would be the clothing and what we are using.

(17:03):
But in the kitchen we are using so much plastic.
It's either food wrapped in plastic or plastic bottles,
plastic spoons. And when you warm the food,
either it's in a pan or is there, it's in the microwave.
You are releasing millions of microplastics.
And sometimes we talk about being worried by thousands of

(17:25):
microplastics. But actually if you are warming
some tea in a plastic cup or some food in the microwave, you
will be releasing millions of microplastics.
And in this case, this is reallywhere there is a highest risk.
And I like to take this example because this is also where you
can act easily, because it's so easy to stop warming food in the

(17:46):
microwave, to stop using plasticor drinking cups which are made
of plastics that you can really change and you will reduce a lot
your exposure to microplastics. Iron is one of the most common
deficiencies that I see in clinic, especially in women.
And it's not just about feeling tired.

(18:07):
Low iron can impact your energy,your focus, your mood and even
your immune system. It's something we really need to
be aware of because if left untreated, iron deficiency can
become very serious. Now UK data shows that around 20
to 35% of women aged 18 to 50 donot need the recommended dietary

(18:28):
guideline for iron intake. And if you're pregnant,
menstruating or following a vegetarian or vegan diet, your
knees are even higher and therefore you're more at risk.
So that's why I often recommend Spartone.
Now this is a naturally sourced iron rich water that comes from
the Welsh pills. It contains ferrous iron, the
most absorbable form, with studies showing up to 40%

(18:51):
absorption. So your body can actually use
what it takes in. Now it's also incredibly gentle,
it's one natural ingredient, there's no harsh tablets and
there's no digestive issues. I use it myself and it is my go
to in clinic. You can pick up Spartone at
Boots and if you've been feelinglow in energy it's absolutely
worth checking in on your iron with your doctor or GP.

(19:17):
It's having consciousness, isn'tit?
I think interestingly, a friend said to me about a year ago, he
said I went into a supermarket and I decided for two weeks to
not be able to. I wasn't allowed to buy anything
that was wrapped in plastic. He gave up after four days
because he just was like it was impossible for me to live.
He wasn't close to a farmers market.
He wasn't close to somewhere that he could go and easily get

(19:39):
this where it was all laid out fresh.
I know that. That's why I find when I go to
places like France into the French markets or into Italy,
they have a lot more fruit and vegetables open outside the ones
of fruit and veggies, much more rich and looks more delicious.
But easily, it's not all wrappedin plastic.
Whereas in London and in certainplaces in America, especially

(20:00):
when I record the show in New York or in LA.
I mean, everything is wrapped inplastic.
It's actually quite hard. And he literally tried, but
after four days he was like, it was impossible.
I actually couldn't buy anything.
Yeah, it is impossible to avoid because nowadays our society is
really using plastic for everything.
And sometimes even if you don't see it and you avoid it because

(20:23):
you see it, you still have microplastics inside.
So it's just everywhere. And not just in the food, it's
in the water, the air you breathe.
And it's really impossible to avoid.
And you can do the best you can,of course, to reduce the
exposure. And there's probably a lot of
what you can do and exposing youcan be avoided.

(20:47):
But avoiding completely plasticsis impossible.
That's where we should not try to be the best version of
ourselves, because otherwise youstop having the social life, you
are being stressed. And even if we are living in a
world of chemicals, plastics andeverything is polluted,

(21:07):
sometimes we are have also to accept it and somehow we can act
on it, but we should not completely being stressed about
it. If it's somebody listening to
this and just hearing maybe the sheer form that they're having
in their lives, maybe unconsciously, how can we make
people not scared? How can we make people not be

(21:28):
fearful around this? Because that's something I'm
also very aware of. I think by explaining this is
really the first step because something which is scary is that
we are exposed to so many chemicals, but we don't know.
When you know what you are exposed to, you can make a
choice. If you want to smoke, you know

(21:48):
that cigarette is toxic, but at least you choose that.
And if you want to buy somethingin plastic, at least if you knew
what it would do, what is in theplastic and the risk, it would
be much better. Nowadays you find some plastics
where it's returned that it's basically a free, so it's free
of that, but then you don't knowwhat's inside.

(22:11):
So if we had transparency, everything was clear.
I think it would be much better to educate people and then to
reduce the fear because this is invisible, impacting us.
I think this would be really thefirst step to raise awareness
and have more transparency. Yeah.
So you just spoke about there something that was really
interesting that you see writtenon a lot of these kind of

(22:32):
plastic products, which is like BPA free.
Can you first of all explain like what that is and is that a
good alternative because there'sa lot of safe alternatives
registered here And do are they really as safe as we think they
are? I will explain first what is BPA
because this is also an interesting story.

(22:53):
Bisphenol ABPA, this is a molecule which is used in
plastics as a plasticizer. This is very small.
This is making plastics quite hard and stable.
And this is in plastics since decades.
And we know since decades that this is an endocrine disruptors.
It will interfere with our hormones.
It can make us infertile. It can have effects really on

(23:17):
the long run on the development of disease.
And this is not something new. If you look back in time in the
1930s, BPA was not invented as aplasticizer.
It was developed to be a contraceptive pill at the
beginning and this was completely forgotten and

(23:38):
nowadays we rediscover that it has effects on human population.
While it was developed actually to have this effect, it was
developed to have this impact. Then it was not used as a
contraceptive pill because therewas some other more efficient
molecules which were used, but it was clear from the beginning
that it was estrogenic. So it was mimicking estrogen

(24:00):
hormones and decades later industry still choose to make it
into plastics into our everyday life knowing that it has this
effect. And still nowadays some
regulatory agencies are debatingis it an undercrime descriptor
or not. Sometimes we are really are in
the crazy world because it was invented for that.

(24:22):
And so we know clearly that thisphenol A is a molecule that
everyone has in their body. Like I don't think you can find
a person who doesn't who don't have BPA in their body.
And that's why BPA has been phased out.
And nowadays in plastic you havealternatives of Bisphenol A
because people are starting to get aware that Bisphenol A is

(24:44):
toxic. And as a replacement, industries
have been choosing not somethingvery complex.
They just replace BPA by BPBCD. They have the whole alphabet
like that. And this is not written on the
package. If you have a plastic, a baby
bottle, which is BPA free, you don't know if there is BPFS or

(25:08):
another one. And that is something that was
really worrying me at some point.
And that's why I, I made one study that I can also explain a
bit more to understand the effects of these alternatives
because that's at the time when I was working at King's College.
I still do, but more lighter position.

(25:29):
I wanted to understand the effects of these alternatives
because I saw that many times with other products there is a
pesticide which is toxic. We identify that, we replace it
by something which is almost identical.
So I wondered if it was the samefor bisphenols.
And for that, I met a scientist working at the US Environmental

(25:51):
Protection Agency, was also interested by this topic and we
teamed up to make a study where we tested a range of
alternatives which are used in plastics nowadays.
And we tested this in breast cancer cells.
This is a model we have in a lab.
We have these cells in a box andthey can be used to understand
if something will interfere withhormone signals.

(26:14):
We did that and we clearly showed that alternatives, not
all of them, but many of them, were more disturbing the
hormones than BPA itself. This is a study which was then
it had consequences. It was a good study.
It was published in one of the top toxicology journal.
It made the front page of the journal, the front page of the

(26:38):
website of the EPA. There was not even a senator in
the US who asked for a bill to be passed to ban these compounds
from baby bottles in some states.
But after that we never heard ofit because there was industry
lobby which cut completely this effort.
And that's why nowadays we are still in the same situation

(27:01):
where we have Bisphenol A alternatives everywhere.
And it's just a marketing to saythat something is BPA free
because you don't know what is inside the bottle.
And it's likely that this is something more toxic.
So people should be aware of this.
And so when you have a baby bottle which is BPA free, if

(27:23):
it's in plastic, this is not safe.
It's better to have a glass bottle.
And I take the example of a babybottle because this is something
which is very important because babies are exposed a lot to
these plastics. Wow, that's so it's still got
the bisphenol in it, but it's just ABCD alternative basically.
That's what you're saying. And but they can still label it

(27:43):
as BPA free because that just means that it's the A
alternative free but not the other ones.
Yeah, this is always the treadmills.
It should change when BPA is identified and in the public
scandal about it's toxicity theycan replace it easily by the B,
the C, the D and they can do thewhole alphabet like that and no

(28:04):
one will raise their eyebrows because this is not something we
talk about in the press. And this is also good for
marketing. Then you can make a new label
sell the bottles even more expensive because they are BPA
free. And is there research to show
like how this affects the babies, like brain development
or or any type of development really, if they're having like

(28:24):
very high levels of this within the bottles?
Yes, the bisphenols to not just the A, but also all the
collection of bisphenols, they interfere with hormones,
especially estrogen hormones. And these hormones have an
importance for everything in ourbody.
It's not just fertility, it's also the brain development.
And so when sensitive individuals are exposed to that,

(28:48):
and by that I mean for instance,pregnant women, like little
small quantities of BPA can disturb the development of the
brain of a baby. And these endocrine descriptors,
there's clear studies, many of them showing that if you are
exposed to this during pregnancy, you have more chance

(29:09):
to have a baby which has cognitive deficits, lower IQ.
This is clear. It sounds scary like that, like
if I was talking about somethinglike speculative like chemtrail
or really absurd concerns. But actually this is really
identified by many scientific studies at these compounds.

(29:30):
They alter the brain developmentleading to cognitive deficits,
the alter reproductive development leading to
infertility and this is really identified since decades now.
This is making a very broad spectrum quote because you kind
of spoke about the cognitive declines.
Do you think things like autism and things like that can also be
affected by these? Yes, and I would not say that

(29:51):
it's just strictly this, but it is a contributor.
There's clearly more cases in ofautism and every year, at least
for instance in the US, they arequite precise about that.
The numbers are also always increasing as before it was one
in 60, now it's one out of 50 boys born to have autism.
It's affecting more the boys in this case and this is clearly

(30:14):
due to endocrine disruptors. I've watched the science of
adaptogens grow personally over the last few years and I've
become more curious in their role in nervous system support,
focus, and resilience because adaptogens basically buffer the
cortisol that gives us that stress and anxiety.
But here's the thing, quality iseverything.
Most adaptogens on the market don't actually contain enough of

(30:36):
the active compounds that you see in clinical studies to make
a difference. That's why I've partnered with
London Nootropics. These guys only use clinical
studies, standardized extracts. This is really really important
to get. The benefits that you're seeing
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Wow. I think you mean there's so much
in there because also it, I think about, you know, babies
now being born, there's more awareness of neurodiversity,
where there's more awareness of it.
And that's why we feel like there's more or whether there is
just an increase in it is like also really hard to understand.

(31:44):
But also alongside that, we're also seeing with fertility,
which you've mentioned, you know, especially male fertility.
I think for so long, you know, women were always not, how do I
say blamed because everything was ever a blame, but it was
always more of the women that welooked at when we have fertility
problems, right? And now we're also being way
more aware that men are experiencing fertility problems.

(32:04):
And since the 1970s, there's been a 50% drop in sperm counts.
And so I think now there's a much more conversation.
And I do want to do a specific fertility episode on this
because I think it's such an important one for men
especially. But it's interesting because now
I'm listening to you speak. There must also be a connection

(32:24):
as well between, you know, what men are ingesting and women are
ingesting and affecting fertility rates.
Yeah, this is well known and it's clear that there is a
fertility crisis in human populations.
And this is something which is silence because like, like
probably you knowing many peoplewho have problems to have babies

(32:46):
and they don't think necessarilyabout having their environment
quality checked whether they're exposed to chemicals.
And this is really now identified as a big contributor.
If you look 1st, 100 years ago, it was already identified that
some populations of birds are disappearing completely because

(33:08):
they are exposed to some toxic endocrine disruptors.
And there were studies already in the 1930s on that and
alligator, so many animals were identified to have fertility
problems because of pollution. And it was only in the 1990s
that it was really discovered that it is also the case in
human. Because we have been observing,

(33:29):
like you said, since 1970s that the sperm quality and
concentration has dropped. Before we were at around 100
million sperm by milliliter. Now we are at 50 million per
milliliter. If you go below that and reach
2015 million per milliliter, this is when you become

(33:51):
infertile. And so we are really not in a
good trajectory. And the link to pollution was
identified clearly in the 1990s where some scientist pointed
that some of these endocrine descriptors, they will alter
either estrogen or testosterone hormones during development of

(34:12):
the baby. And so the babies which are born
have the development is slower, they have less testosterone, the
sperm quality is lower and in the end they become infertile as
an adult. And this is now very clear.
And this is the problem identified in males but also for

(34:33):
females, this is also a problem.Nowadays we also know that these
products also microplastics or bisphenols or all these
endocrine disruptors, they also interfere with women, fertility
and couples who are exposed to these.
It's clear from epidemiological studies like you measure that in
blood or urine and you see that for the people who have the

(34:55):
highest level, they have difficulties to have kids, they
have miscarriage and this is really making them infertile.
I think it's. Such an important point because
I think fertility is, is carriesa lot of shame with it.
I think miscarriage, especially from when we had conversations
on this show and from friends that have suffered, carries such
a heavyweight. I think men also, it carries a

(35:17):
massive heavyweight of shame to think that, you know, their
morphology or their sperm count is lower than it should be and
it's their fault. And then they've had to watch
their partner go through IVF andthey feel very guilty and it's
very hard for them to have a conversation about that because
they they're struggling with thethe shame that they're carrying.
And then this is a very sweepingstatement.
And I'm sure there are some fertility clinics that do this,

(35:39):
but I don't think that many fertility clinics focus on this,
focus on the actual other important conversations that we
should be having, such as the nutrition that we're consuming,
such as the microplastics, such as the environment, such as the
chemicals that we're around. If people were more aware of
these other things that they could do, it's really important.
And for instance, egg freezing, it's another really important

(36:01):
thing that is increasing becausewomen are maybe not finding the
right partners are having children later than ever before.
I'm not sure whether they want to have children because people
are working, you know, they're carrying on their careers.
And I also found it really interesting that women that had
higher levels of microplastics had less a fewer eggs retrieved
in the egg retrieval. And there was also microplastics

(36:25):
in the follicule fluid and thesethings I don't think are spoken
about. And so if you are having a a
lighter egg retrieval than someone else, we're not knowing
if that's because of the microplastics in the blood.
You know, that conversation has never been discussed.
And so there's such a bigger conversation here that we could
be having to support fertility for men and women.

(36:46):
So for anyone listening to this that's maybe going through an
egg retrieval, that's maybe going through IVF, that's maybe
just found out as a man they've got a lower sperm count or their
morphology is not as great as they wished it was for either
gender, Like navigating this. What advice would you give them
in terms of microplastics and how to try and reduce them to
maybe to conceivable or have a healthier baby that won't have

(37:09):
these problems that you've just discussed?
It's clear that there is a job to be created here, or better
organized at least, is that these couples, or at least maybe
even everyone wants to have a kid.
To have preconception consultations so that couples
are guided what they should do for their nutrition, what they

(37:30):
should do for exposure to chemicals, their lifestyle in
general. And this doesn't exist.
And this would avoid a lot of issues in babies if we had these
preconception consultations because we don't have that.
Unfortunately, we have to. We have.
Live well, be well we have live well, be well, Robin and.

(37:51):
We can educate with this media and for that there's there's so
many things we can do, but there's a few things which are
more important is to be careful with plastics in the kitchen to
avoid warming in plastic, to avoid using ultra processed food
to cook by yourself with fresh ingredients, which also

(38:13):
guarantees that it's better quality.
That is one thing which is important.
Ventilating the house, it's veryimportant because you have also
a lot of endocrine descriptors which are floating in the air
because of the material of the couch or the paints.
And if you are ventilating the house frequently, at least every
day, this is something which canbe helpful cleaning also because

(38:38):
they are accumulating the dust. And if you have dust everywhere
and touch the dust, you would bealso more exposed to that.
And there are some also more specific things like not eating
too much fish which is high in heavy metals like salmon, tuna.
These are fish which are contaminated a lot by heavy

(38:59):
metals and that can also influence health.
Gosh, it's so hard, isn't it? Because I speak about fish so
much, Because I am and my team will be laughing at me listening
to this and watching it because I'm a massive advocate of
omega-3 fatty acids, EPA and DHA, the longer chains that you
can only get in fatty fish. So then we come into this
conundrum of like, well, I hear people talk about the importance

(39:21):
of fatty fish, especially in pregnancy, because that's so
important for the third trimester of brain development
for the child. And our needs go up because it's
for the mummy and the baby. And then we hear, ohh, but it's
also gonna be an endocrine to scrap to it.
So it's just gonna have microplastic.
So how does one navigate that? If you eat smaller fish, this is
also soda, yes. And if you want to have your

(39:43):
Omega threes nowadays, there aresome good supplementation with
algae oil, which is not high in these contaminants which can be
used. And this is much more handy than
to really consume a lot of fish because it's also very difficult
to reach these omega-3 levels which are having an effect.
You have to eat a lot of fish for that.
And so this is. One aspect for which

(40:06):
supplementation can be important.
Yeah. I will caveat that though is
that we just, we're still aren'tsure about the absorption of all
the different supplements. It's such a hard, just such a
hard one to navigate. And I and I, I put that in as a
nutritionist because, you know, we, we can say you can
supplement, but actually do we know the absorption rate?
We're really not entirely sure. It depends on the manufacturer.

(40:28):
You know, half of them only have25% of that tablet actually made
of DHEA and the other is bulkingagents.
So it's such a confusing, it's such a confusing.
Area as well, when you go into the details like that, people
get scared because they feel that there's nothing they can do
for their life to avoid these chemicals.
And that's why I think we shouldreally stay high level of like

(40:52):
trying to to diminish exposure with like simple things, not
just looking at everything in the kitchen, but removing the
plastics to ventilate, to have acleaner house and to avoid like
a synthetic chemicals and synthetic products in clothing.

(41:13):
Cosmetics also is something thatwomen don't need to overuse all
the time. I'm not saying that women should
not use cosmetics because this is also something which makes
comfortable and happy and emotional happy is very
important, but during pregnancy this is really a period where
you should minimize as much as possible and use the natural

(41:35):
ones because this is full of toxic chemicals.
Cleaning products as well, wearing gloves when you are
cleaning you open the windows. So these little things can make
in the end a big impact without being completely stressed about
lifestyle. Yeah, I think like the thing
that I realized that I actually changed all of my household
products to more eco products. And a lot of these eco products

(41:57):
you can also get on subscriptionbase.
You haven't got to think about trying to go to the supermarket
to get it, which is great for mewhere I struggle to get
supermarket. But also I think it's, it's just
having the awareness and this conversation, the ventilation in
the house. I remember my mum texted me and
saying I feel like I do all these things.
I feel very happy about my, you know, microplastic use.

(42:18):
And those are the things I thinkthat it is, is important.
But I do think that trying to give people the Otalis, I'm
going to get back to the MO 3 because there are things you can
do. I was just thinking sardines on
toast, kippers on toast, anchovies.
I've started putting anchovies on my omelets and stuff.
These are all great ways to get in the omega-3 without having to

(42:39):
just take a supplement. I was just thinking in my brain,
what is it that we could give people as actual advice?
And they are still ways you can get in fish that are the smaller
fish that have less of the heavymetals than the tunas and the
salmons. Yeah, that's good advice.
And this is also good because it's practical.
Then you get some ideas of recipes you can implement and
that's all about creating a routine.

(43:02):
Because then if you have to force yourself think about it,
this is something which becomes difficult.
But like everything about lifestyle, if you want to change
to work, it has to work as a routine.
So this is really something where you do it every week, you
try to do it at the same time, the same day and this is then
step by step all these little change which seemed difficult at

(43:26):
the beginning. In the end, after that, after
some point you forget about it and just you do it
automatically. And one thing I wanted to ask,
and I heard about this coming here, because I was trying to
listen to lots of different information around microplastics
just to kind of see where the currency of affairs are.
And one person was talking aboutsaunas being a really good way
to also help detox. I'm very aware of using the word

(43:48):
detox, but to help eliminate microplastics out of our bodies
via sweat, is that scientifically proven?
Like is it good? I mean, I know there's an
amazing health benefit of havingsoreness for cardiovascular
systems, but does that translateinto microplastics?
Can we kind of simply sweat it out or not?
Not really. There was a study showing that

(44:10):
in sweat you can find some plastics like phthalate and then
you think that you are getting less intoxicated by that.
But there was just one study andthis is small quantities.
It's not just it's not the main reason for being doing some
sauna. Sauna is great.
It's clearly having a lot of benefits.

(44:30):
But if you want to detox, which is also a world that I don't
like so much, if you want to detox from toxic chemicals,
sauna is really not the best wayfor that.
OK, that's I'm really glad you said that because there's so
much conversation in a world that I'm not very connected to,
which is the biohacking world. Yes, there's some like truths
there for sure. But I think sometimes we can get

(44:51):
too obsessed with certain thingsthat we think have a huge
outcome and actually they don't.But I do love a sauna and I do
have to say it has incredible benefits for other things such
as like a cardiovascular system,right?
So let's go to food, my favoriteand I know that you've done a
lot of work in food. Now there is a huge conversation
around organic versus non organic.

(45:13):
You've mentioned pesticides in our five questions for substat,
the compassionate cure that that's where your work basically
started. So when we're kind of thinking
about reducing our toxic load that we're ingesting food is
confusing organic versus non organic.
All of these things people are like, is it worth, is it worth

(45:34):
paying the extra $0.50 or 50 lbsor whatever it is £50, gosh,
sorry, 50P. If you're paying an extra £50
then that's quite expensive. But you know, when we're really
bringing it down, is it worth the extra margin to buy organic?
And if it is on what types of products and what types of food
should we be really veering towards when we're looking at

(45:54):
organic? Yeah, it's a very complex
question because nowadays organic food has become a market
and so it's industrialized and you find some things which are
sometimes a bit contradictory with in the first principles of
organic food. And buying organic is sometimes
useful. Like if you want to protect

(46:15):
someone like a pregnant woman and be on the safe side, buying
organic fruits and vegetables isa good thing.
If you want to buy organic, can you buy cereal bars and this
type of things? This is wasting your money in
this case. It's ultra processed.
Yeah, there's a lot of ultra processed food, which is

(46:37):
organic. That was a survey in a French
supermarket done a couple of years ago.
And 25% of the organic food is actually ultra processed and
it's really a big market. This is not something that was
the case 20 years ago when organic food was really first
becoming a bit trendy. It was on the farmers market.

(46:57):
You were buying your fresh fruits and vegetables.
They were not wrapped in plastic.
And in this case, this organic food is much healthier.
It's more rich in polyphenols, more rich in vitamins because of
fruits and vegetables take theirtime to mature, They have less
pesticides and synthetic fertilizer.

(47:19):
So this is really much healthier.
But nowadays organic food is industrialized and you find
something which are completely contradictory.
You find some fruits which are organic and they have to be
wrapped in plastics in supermarket.
And in this case, what is the point of buying this type of
organic food? That's where it's really

(47:41):
difficult to go into the detail about 1 by 1.
But I would say that really fruits and vegetables, if you
want to take care of your health, it's much better to buy
them organic. And in this case, to avoid to
buy them in a supermarket if youcan.
And if you can buy it in the market, if you can buy it in

(48:02):
some other type of grocery stores where it's more naturally
preserved, not wrapped in plastic, this is much better.
And I also think there is an important conversation because I
spend a lot of time in the US atthe moment, especially with the
show. And I used to live in New York
for a very long time, 10 years ago when the health industry
was, was less of a marketable industry back then than it is

(48:25):
now. I also think there's really
different laws between the American and the EU and I think,
and now in England, because sadly, or the UK because we're
sadly not part of the EU. But again, like you can I, I
trust it a bit more here on not having organic, but I will
always buy organic when I'm in America just because of the
regulations are so different. Yes, the regulations in the US

(48:48):
are really helpful for the use of pesticides.
There are things which are banned since a long time in the
EU because we know that it's very toxic and there it is used
white scale without any precaution.
And so there are countries maybethat deserve to have more focus
on organic foods than others, for sure.

(49:08):
But I guess if you're going intosupermarkets and you're buying
an organic food wrapped in plastic, it's probably not going
to be that beneficial to spend the extra money.
Is that kind of the conclusion that we're coming to?
But if you're buying a banana that's just on the shelf that's
organic, then that's probably worth the investment of the
extra extra money to buy that banana.
Yes, and you can go into the like a level of details on what

(49:32):
to buy or not. Because not every fruit and
vegetables are contaminated the same by pesticides and toxics.
And when you are buying strawberries, apples, like
fruits which are a bit soft and can be attacked by insects in
the field, these ones are sprayed more with pesticides and
that is better in this case to buy the organic versions for

(49:57):
leafy vegetable like spinach, lettuce, all of that stuff is
also sprayed a lot because they are fragile in the field.
And if you buy for instance broccoli or some things which is
growing below the ground, generally they are on the safer
side. And in this case you can make

(50:17):
more educated choice. And if you have a bit more money
to spend for choosing organic, you can buy what has the most
impact. Wow.
So how bad a pesticide for us? Because I think we hear a lot
about it, but I don't think we speak about it as much in terms
of research. We haven't done on this show for
at least very long time. So how worried should we be
about the pesticides that are sprayed all over our crops?

(50:41):
Well, pesticides are meant to kill.
They are meant to kill plants. If they are herbicides, insects
is are insecticides. And so manufacturers of
pesticides, they try to make it as safe as possible.
There is no intention of of being harmful, but often this is
not the case. And you discover after a few

(51:02):
decades that these pesticides also alter and the crying
signals, many of them, they are under crying disruptors.
They will cause some cancers, they will cause some
neurodegenerative disease and often in the more sensitive
individuals like kids or elderly, elderly people.
And it's much better to avoid pesticides.

(51:25):
But in this case, I want to add that it's not just about fruits
and vegetables. We are using a lot of pesticides
in our homes and we don't realize that because many people
will use some insecticides to get rid of a wasp or to get rid
of mosquitoes. And in this case, I see you all
feel concerned. Oh, OK, so the reason why I'm

(51:46):
going to ask this question is I put a picture on my social media
a couple of weeks ago when I wason holiday in France because I,
I have this blood that mosquitoes love and I landed
from the airport and from the airport to where I was staying,
which was an hour away in a car.I got bitten 8 times.
And so, you know, I was and whatmy arm had actually inflamed so

(52:08):
bad that I couldn't wear my watch and it was, it was just so
itchy. And I obviously have a bit of an
allergic reaction anyway. So I'm spraying myself
constantly in mosquito spray. There are natural products which
are better than others. I don't think they were the.
Most toxic are really the one wespray in our house.

(52:28):
OK, so mosquito spray is fine. Well, fine to be avoided if you
can. And probably the most dangerous
I would say is what we put on the skin of our dogs or cats or
on the collar for lice or ticks to avoid them to be beaten.

(52:49):
Because in this case, this is really loaded with insecticides
which are toxic. We often talk about like
insecticides which are in fieldsand protecting the pollinators
because they are very sensitive.But in these collars you have
the doses of insecticides which can kills entire hives of bees

(53:10):
and no one really know about it and talk about it.
And we are just like cuddling our pets.
And if we are putting them thesecollars, we are affecting their
health and our health as well. And so this is really something
to be avoided if you can. Sometimes it's just so easy for
people who live in a city, they don't really have to worry about

(53:33):
some of these parasites because their dogs don't go so much
outside. It's better to avoid.
And I know some people to do it automatically because their vets
told them to do that, to use this collar and they don't need
to. And I told them, look, avoid
that and there's no problem. It doesn't have an impact.
Wow. We don't really think about the
impact that our pets have, do we?

(53:55):
Very. Yeah, we don't.
I guess it's, it's such a bigger, wider load of question,
isn't it? So thinking about this on a
whole, and I want to make sure that we kind of wrap this up in
a really hopeful way with a big bow on the top, which I know is
maybe not how people have felt during this.
Like I don't want us to turn into plastic zombies.
What is your kind of thoughts onat the next five years of

(54:17):
plastic usage and things that whether we can do it as a
country, as a policy, as an individual.
You know, why should we have a lot of hope that we're not going
to turn into plastic zombies, basically?
Yeah, it's true that when we have this conversation,
sometimes it's scary and it has a lot of message of fear.
But there's a lot we can do for ourselves 1st.

(54:39):
And also in the future, it's clear that I feel we have passed
the worst period of intoxicationbecause nowadays we see more and
more green plastics which are made of plants, compounds.
We see a more and more awareness.
So it's we are at the beginning,but I feel that the next 5-10

(55:00):
years will be much better and wewill see a decrease in the
exposure to these compounds. Amazing.
So I guess for people to be likereally proactive stepping
forward, it's literally look into the kitchen.
I was just thinking there are even like plastic chopping
boards or plastic knives or anything like that.
Try and replace it with wooden and like proper stir, like
proper good knives. That's also just important so

(55:22):
you can cut your vegetables properly.
Thinking about the Teflon thingsthat people cook in that
obviously were great because it would well, they weren't great,
but they would promote themselves as non stick.
So really looking at saucepans, looking at babies bottles, what
you're storing your food in, howyou're heating your food up, All
of these like small changes even, you know, make sure you're

(55:44):
going to go shopping bags, not even put your fruits and
vegetables into a plastic shopping bag.
Trying to carry a stainless steel water bottle with you?
All of these things can make massive changes.
It can make a massive change andit's also empowering when you do
that for yourself because you'rereally getting control about

(56:04):
your lifestyle. You change for wooden shopping
board, you also changing some other things in your kitchen and
you've you really take control of your lifestyle.
You can raise awareness to others and this is really
empowering because then you feelthat you, you know what you are
doing. And then you can take also extra

(56:25):
steps of of like cooking healthier or making some plans
for your better nutrition, physical activity, sleep and all
of that. All the aspects of lifestyle can
which can be modulated. I feel that when people get some
little advice, it's they can getinto their routine.
It's really empowering and then you can really become proud of

(56:49):
yourself. It's also a challenge to start
cooking on the pan, which is notmade of Teflon.
It's not easy, but then it's really a process and you get
used to that. And this is really where like,
it's a first changing habit, then it's build a routine and
then you change completely your lifestyle.
And for the next decades, you are more likely to end up your

(57:11):
life with being healthy and alsovery happy, because this is also
fulfilling. You and I guess that takes us
back to a really big question and the five questions, which
was, you know, being more mindful than actually knowing
that you can rely on yourself. And I think sometimes with this
load of information that people might have just got from this
episode, it's not about having to do it all in one go.

(57:31):
I always say with trying to increase your fruit and
vegetable consumption is every time you go to the shop to do a
big shop, add in one or two pieces of Whole Foods that
you've never used or never cooked with.
Just do that. And by the end of the month
you've increased it by the four or eight without really putting
too much stress on. And so I'd say with this, take
one thing today to reduce and then write them all down and

(57:54):
then add another one in three weeks because you've already
started to become more accustomed to it.
Rather than saying we're going to do these 10 things in one go
because then that that brain is too much of a mental load to
kind of carry. So just doing one thing at a
time, similar to how I try and look at this now, how I approach
tasks. If I try and do 10 at once I'm
going to fail, but if I just keep slowly ticking one off I

(58:16):
slowly get to the end of that list.
Yeah, you can put a note on yourfridge about something new to
change your lifestyle in the next weeks and you do that.
And at at some point it become ahabit.
And we all should always try to accept also that sometimes it's
difficult to be the best versionof ourselves.

(58:36):
We should not strive for that because we have a social life
and not everything can be controlled.
So we should also accept to for our well-being these little
imperfections but try constantlyto improve the small things
which are controllable. I know my wife always tell me
when the I come home and she hears something I say but we

(58:59):
don't do that at home. We should change that.
This is also part of trying to have a normal life.
We have so many things in our lives which are difficult to
control. Sometimes healthy food or
healthy lifestyle is makes the top of the list.
But then you will have some problems whether it's health or

(59:20):
personal or social. And being healthy is not anymore
the priority. And in this case, that's why we
should really just have a thin layer of improvements which
build on, because you can't justalways have this as a main
target. We have to have this in our
whole life. Beautifully said.

(59:42):
And so that makes me to my last question, Robin, which is what
does live well be well mean to you?
I really like the show because it's a balance between not just
health but also other aspects ofmental well-being or social
aspects. I was looking at there was 1

(01:00:03):
episode on loneliness for instance.
This is nice because then it's just not just about like
technologies, tools that you canuse, but it's just it's about
the life in general. Like we, like people, live it in
real life, not just about artificial.
Tools that work on 1% of people.Thank you.

(01:00:26):
Well, I love that that's what Liverpool means to you.
I think it is, it's very multifaceted.
And I think that's the BT of today's conversation, right?
It's there's the evidence and itmight change, but right now this
is where we lie and to become more conscious in the decisions
that we can do for ourselves, that we can tweak and pull.
And as you said, those pieces ofthe pie are going to change

(01:00:47):
depending on each individual circumstance.
So, Robin, it's been an amazing conversation.
I'm so pleased that you've come onto the show and speaking about
something that is on not just trend, but a concern and affair
for so many people. And I hope we've managed to
balance some of those concerns in today's episode.
And I'd love for you to come back on and do another one

(01:01:12):
because I know you also very much look at fasting as well.
And I'd love to kind of explore a little bit more deep here with
you even whether that can balance the effects of
microplastics. So.
It will be a pleasure. So thank you so much for coming
on to live Well. Be well.

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The Truth About BPA-Free: Microplastics, Hormone Disruptors & Baby Bottle Risks | Dr. Robin Mesnage

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}The Truth About BPA-Free: Microplastics, Hormone Disruptors & Baby Bottle Risks | Dr. Robin Mesnage