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Human Health Effects and Risk Assessment Trends of Microplastics Contaminating the Food Environment
Original title: 식품 환경 오염 미세플라스틱의 인체 영향과 위해평가 동향
Summary
This Korean review examined the human health effects of microplastics found in food and the environment, noting a lack of standardized detection methods as a major research barrier. European countries are actively developing detection standards to enable more consistent and comparable health risk assessments.
Microplastics with a size of less than 5 mm have emerged as an important environmental and food safety issue, as they have been detected not only in marine but also in terrestrial ecosystem and drinking water. Although many studies have been conducted on the exposure of microplastics and the effects on human health, the lack of standardized experimental methods for microplastics has been reviewed as a major problem. In order to overcome this, European countries such as the Netherlands and Germany are conducting a project to develop detection methods for microplastics as well as to establish the risk assessment methodologies for microplastics. Being the microplastics suggested to have a substantially potential risk on human health, reliable risk assessments should be conducted considering the various sources of microplastics, chemical pollutants and biological factors. In addition, international standards and regulations should be applied.