It’s Not Fantastic To Be Plastic
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We Are Such Stuff As Bottles Are Made Of
We’ve written before about PFAS, often found in non-stick coatings and the like:
PFAS Exposure & Cancer: The Numbers Are High
Today we’re going to be talking about microplastics & nanoplastics!
What are microplastics and nanoplastics?
Firstly, they’renot just the now-banned plastic microbeads that have seen some use is toiletries (although those are classified as microplastics too).
Many are much smaller than that, and if they get smaller than a thousandth of a millimeter, then they get the additional classification of “nanoplastic”.
In other words: not something that can be filtered even if you were to use a single-micron filter. The microplastics would still get through, for example:
Scientists find about a quarter million invisible nanoplastic particles in a liter of bottled water
And unfortunately, that’s bad:
❝What’s disturbing is that small particles can appear in different organs and may cross membranes that they aren’t meant to cross, such as the blood-brain barrier❞
Note: they’re crossing the same blood-brain barrier that many of our nutrients and neurochemicals are too big to cross.
These microplastics are also being found in arterial plaque
What makes arterial plaque bad for the health is precisely its plasticity (the arterial walls themselves are elastic), so you most certainly do not want actual plastic being used as part of the cement that shouldn’t even be lining your arteries in the first place:
Microplastics found in artery plaque linked with higher risk of heart attack, stroke and death
❝In this study, patients with carotid artery plaque in which MNPs were detected had a higher risk of a composite of myocardial infarction, stroke, or death from any cause at 34 months of follow-up than those in whom MNPs were not detected❞
~ Dr. Raffaele Marfella et al.
(MNP = Micro/Nanoplastics)
Source: Microplastics and Nanoplastics in Atheromas and Cardiovascular Events
We don’t know how bad this is yet
There are various ways this might not be as bad as it looks (the results may not be repeated, the samples could have been compromised, etc), but also, perhaps cynically but nevertheless honestly, it could also be worse than we know yet—only more experiments being done will tell us which.
In the meantime, here’s a rundown of what we do and don’t know:
Study links microplastics with human health problems—but there’s still a lot we don’t know
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An Elegant Defense – by Matt Richtel
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In a way, Richtel got the best and worst of the publication date lottery. This book, which he’d obviously been working on for however long, was published in March 2020. Yes, that March 2020. So, it obviously got a huge boost in sales that launced it to bestseller status, and/but it doesn’t actually discuss COVID at all.
What it does discuss, is—as one might expect—the immune system. Or really, the immune systems, plural, several systems working alongside each other. How we got to have such, how our immune functions work, where all the various immune cells come from and what part they play. What pathogens can do to fight and/or confuse (or even co-opt) our immune response, and what modern medicine can do to counteract the pathogens’ anti-countermeasure countermeasures. And how it can still go wrong.
The “Four Lives” promised in the subtitle are stories, and Richtel explains the immune system through specific people’s specific battles. In particular, a friend of his who had quite a remarkable battle against cancer, which was of course terrible for him, but illustrative for us.
The style of the book is very readably journalistic. The author is a Pulitzer-winning NYT journalist, and not normally a science writer. Here at 10almonds, “we like big bibliographies and we cannot lie”, and we didn’t get to enjoy that in this case. The book contained no bibliography (nor appropriate inline citations, nor equivalent footnotes). Maybe a future addition will include this.
Bottom line: there’s a lot of “science for the lay reader” here. While the lack of references is a big oversight, the book does give a very good overview of what both sides (immune response and pathogenic invasion) bring to the battle of your body.
Click here to check out Elegant Defense, and demystify immunology!
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ADHD… As An Adult?
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ADHD—not just for kids!
Consider the following:
- If a kid has consistent problems paying attention, it’s easy and common to say “Aha, ADHD!”
- If a young adult has consistent problems paying attention, it’s easy and common to say “Aha, a disinterested ne’er-do-well!”
- If an older adult has consistent problems paying attention, it’s easy and common to say “Aha, a senior moment!”
Yet, if we recognize that ADHD is fundamentally a brain difference in children (and we do; there are physiological characteristics that we can test), and we can recognize that as people get older our brains typically have less neuroplasticity (ability to change) than when we are younger rather than less, then… Surely, there are just as many adults with ADHD as kids!
After all, that rather goes with the linear nature of time and the progressive nature of getting older.
So why do kids get diagnoses so much more often than adults?
Parents—and schools—can find children’s ADHD challenging, and it’s their problem, so they look for an explanation, and ADHD isn’t too difficult to find as a diagnosis.
Meanwhile, adults with ADHD have usually developed coping mechanisms, have learned to mask and/or compensate for their symptoms, and we expect adults to manage their own problems, so nobody’s rushing to find an explanation on their behalf.
Additionally, the stigma of neurodivergence—especially something popularly associated with children—isn’t something that many adults will want for themselves.
But, if you have an ADHD brain, then recognizing that (even if just privately to yourself) can open the door to much better management of your symptoms… and your life.
So what does ADHD look like in adults?
ADHD involves a spread of symptoms, and not everyone will have them all, or have them in the same magnitude. However, very commonly most noticeable traits include:
- Lack of focus (ease of distraction)
- Conversely: high focus (on the wrong things)
- To illustrate: someone with ADHD might set out to quickly tidy the sock drawer, and end up Marie Kondo-ing their entire wardrobe… when they were supposed to doing something else
- Conversely: high focus (on the wrong things)
- Poor time management (especially: tendency to procrastinate)
- Forgetfulness (of various kinds—for example, forgetting information, and forgetting to do things)
Want To Take A Quick Test? Click Here ← this one is reputable, and free. No sign in required; the test is right there.
Wait, where’s the hyperactivity in this Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder?
It’s often not there. ADHD is simply badly-named. This stems from how a lot of mental health issues are considered by society in terms of how much they affect (and are observable by) other people. Since ADHD was originally noticed in children (in fact being originally called “Hyperkinetic Reaction of Childhood”), it ended up being something like:
“Oh, your brain has an inconvenient relationship with dopamine and you are driven to try to correct that by shifting attention from boring things to stimulating things? You might have trouble-sitting-still disorder”
Hmm, this sounds like me (or my loved one); what to do now at the age of __?
Some things to consider:
- If you don’t want medication (there are pros and cons, beyond the scope of today’s article), you might consider an official diagnosis not worth pursuing. That’s fine if so, because…
- More important than whether or not you meet certain diagnostic criteria, is whether or not the strategies recommended for it might help you.
- Whether or not you talk to other people about it is entirely up to you. Maybe it’s a stigma you’d rather avoid… Or maybe it’ll help those around you to better understand and support you.
- Either way, you might want to learn more about ADHD in adults. Today’s article was about recognizing it—we’ll write more about managing it another time!
In the meantime… We recommended a great book about this a couple of weeks ago; you might want to check it out:
Click here to see our review of “The Silent Struggle: Taking Charge of ADHD in Adults”!
Note: the review is at the bottom of that page. You’ll need to scroll past the video (which is also about ADHD) without getting distracted by it and forgetting you were there to see about the book. So:
- Click the above link
- Scroll straight to the review!
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Falling: Is It Due To Age Or Health Issues?
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It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small 😎
❝What are the signs that a senior is falling due to health issues rather than just aging?❞
Superficial answer: having an ear infection can result in a loss of balance, and is not particularly tied to age as a risk factor
More useful answer: first, let’s consider these two true statements:
- The risks of falling (both the probability and the severity of consequences) increase with age
- Health issues (in general) tend to increase with age
With this in mind, it’s difficult to disconnect the two, as neither exist in a vacuum, and each is strongly associated with the other.
So the question is easier to answer by first flipping it, to ask:
❝What are the health issues that typically increase with age, that increase the chances of falling?❞
A non-exhaustive list includes:
- Loss of strength due to sarcopenia (reduced muscle mass)
- Loss of mobility due to increased stiffness (many causes, most of which worsen with age)
- Loss of risk-awareness due to diminished senses (for example, not seeing an obstacle until too late)
- Loss of risk-awareness due to reduced mental focus (cognitive decline producing absent-mindedness)
Note that in the last example there, and to a lesser extent the third one, reminds us that falls also often do not happen in a vacuum. There is (despite how it may sometimes feel!) no actual change in our physical relationship with gravity as we get older; most falls are about falling over things, even if it’s just one’s own feet:
The 4 Bad Habits That Cause The Most Falls While Walking
Disclaimer: sometimes a person may just fall down for no external reason. An example of why this may happen is if a person’s joint (for example an ankle or a knee) has a particular weakness that means it’ll occasionally just buckle and collapse under one’s own weight. This doesn’t even have to be a lot of weight! The weakness could be due to an old injury, or Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (with its characteristic joint hypermobility symptoms), or something else entirely.
Now, notice how:
- all of these things can happen at any age
- all of these things are more likely to happen the older we get
- none of these things have to happen at any age
That last one’s important to remember! Aging is often viewed as an implacable Behemoth, but the truth is that it is many-faceted and every single one of those facets can be countered, to a greater or lesser degree.
Think of a room full of 80-year-olds, and now imagine that…
- One has the hearing of a 20-year-old
- One has the eyesight of a 20-year-old
- One has the sharp quick mind of a 20-year-old
- One has the cardiovascular fitness of a 20-year-old
…etc. Now, none of those things in isolation is unthinkable, so remember, there is no magic law of the universe saying we can’t have each of them:
Age & Aging: What Can (And Can’t) We Do About It?
Which means: that goes for the things that increase the risk of falling, too. In other words, we can combat sarcopenia with protein and resistance training, maintain our mobility, look after our sensory organs as best we can, nourish our brain and keep it sharp, etc etc etc:
Train For The Event Of Your Life! (Mobility As A Long-Term “Athletic” Goal For Personal Safety)
Which doesn’t mean: that we will necessarily succeed in all areas. Your writer here, broadly in excellent health, and whose lower body is still a veritable powerhouse in athletic terms, has a right ankle and left knee that will sometimes just buckle (yay, the aforementioned hypermobility).
So, it becomes a priority to pre-empt the consequences of that, for example:
- being able to fall with minimal impact (this is a matter of knowing how, and can be learned from “soft” martial arts such as aikido), and
- ensuring the skeleton can take a knock if necessary (keeping a good balance of vitamins, minerals, protein, etc; keeping an eye on bone density).
See also:
Fall Special ← appropriate for the coming season, but it’s about avoiding falling, and reducing the damage of falling if one does fall, including some exercises to try at home.
Take care!
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Do Probiotics Work For Weight Loss?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝Can you talk about using probiotics for weight loss? Thanks❞
Great question! First, a quick catch-up:
How Much Difference Do Probiotic Supplements Make, Really?
Our above-linked article covers a number of important benefits of probiotic supplements, but we didn’t talk about weight loss at all. So let’s examine whether probiotics are useful for weight loss.
Up-front summary: the science is unclear
This 2021 systematic review found that they are indeed very effective:
❝The intake of probiotics or synbiotics could lead to significant weight reductions, either maintaining habitual lifestyle habits or in combination with energy restriction and/or increased physical activity for an average of 12 weeks.
Specific strains belonging to the genus Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium were the most used and those that showed the best results in reducing body weight.
Both probiotics and synbiotics have the potential to help in weight loss in overweight and obese populations.❞
This slightly older (2015) systematic review and meta-analysis found the opposite:
❝Collectively, the RCTs examined in this meta-analysis indicated that probiotics have limited efficacy in terms of decreasing body weight and BMI and were not effective for weight loss.❞
Source: Probiotics for weight loss: a systematic review and meta-analysis
And in case that’s not balanced enough, this 2020 randomized controlled trial got mixed results:
❝Regression analysis performed to correlate abundance of species following supplementation with body composition parameters and biomarkers of obesity found an association between a decrease over time in blood glucose and an increase in Lactobacillus abundance, particularly in the synbiotic group.
However, the decrease over time in body mass, BMI, waist circumstance, and body fat mass was associated with a decrease in Bifidobacterium abundance.❞
Source: Effects of Synbiotic Supplement on Human Gut Microbiota, Body Composition and Weight Loss in Obesity
Summary
Probiotics may or may not work for weight loss.
In all likelihood, it depends on the blend of cultures contained in the supplement. It’s possible that Lactobacillus is more beneficial for weight loss than Bifidobacterium, which latter may actually reduce weight loss.
Or it might not, because that was just one study and correlation ≠ causation!
We’d love to give you a hard-and-fast answer, but if the data doesn’t support a hard-and-fast answer, we’re not going to lie to you.
What we can say for sure though is that probiotics come with very many health benefits, so whether or not weight loss is one of them, they’re a good thing to have for most people.
Some further articles that may interest you:
- How Much Difference Do Probiotic Supplements Make, Really? ← the aforementioned article
- Making Friends With Your Gut (You Can Thank Us Later) ← gut health 101
- Burn! How To Boost Your Metabolism ← these things can help change your metabolic base rate, which is highly relevant to weight loss
- How To Do HIIT (Without Wrecking Your Body) ←unlike most forms of exercise, which cause the body to slow the metabolism afterwards to compensate, high-intensity interval training results in an increased metabolic rate (so generally: fat-burning) for several hours after training.
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
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Great Sex Never Gets Old – by Kimberly Cunningham – by Kimberly Cunningham
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Here some readers may be thinking “after 40? But I am 70 already” or such, so be assured, there’s no upper limit on the applicability of this book’s writings. The number of 40 was chosen more as the start point of things, because it is an age after which the majority of hormonal declines happen (and with them, often, sex drive and/or physical ability). But, as she explains, this is by no means necessarily an end, and can instead be an exciting new beginning.
She kicks things off with a “wellness check”, before diving into the science of the menopause—and yes, the andropause too.
She doesn’t stop there though, and discusses other hormones besides the obvious ones, and other non-hormonal factors that can affect sex in what for most people is the later half of life.
Nurse Cunningham, much like most of modern science, is strongly pro-HRT, and/but doesn’t claim it to be a magic bullet (though honestly, it can feel like it is! But here we’re reviewing the book, not HRT, so let’s continue), or else this book could have been a leaflet. Instead, she talks about the side-effects to expect (mostly good or neutral, but still, things you don’t want to be taken by surprise by), and what things will just be “a little different” now if you’re running on exogenous bioidentical hormones rather than ones your own body made. A lot of this comes down to how and when one takes them, by the way, since this can be different to your body making its own natural peaks and troughs.
But it’s not all about hormones; there are also plenty of chapters on social and psychological issues, as well as medical issues other than hormones.
The style is very light and conversational, while also casually dropping about 30 pages of scientific references. Like many nurses, the author knows at least as much as doctors when it comes to her area of expertise, and it shows.
Bottom line: if your sex has ever hit a slump, and/or you simply recognize that it could, this book could make a very important difference.
Click here to check out Great Sex Never Gets Old, and enjoy the best of life in the bedroom too!
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The Fascinating Truth About Aspartame, Cancer, & Neurotoxicity
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Is Aspartame’s Reputation Well-Deserved?
In Tuesday’s newsletter, we asked you for your health-related opinions on aspartame, and got the above-depicted, below-described, set of responses:
- About 47% said “It is an evil carcinogenic neurotoxin”
- 20% said “It is safe-ish, but has health risks that are worse than sugar”
- About 19% said “It is not healthy, but better than sugar”
- About 15% said “It’s a perfectly healthy replacement for sugar”
But what does the science say?
Aspartame is carcinogenic: True or False?
False, assuming consuming it in moderation. In excess, almost anything can cause cancer (oxygen is a fine example). But for all meaningful purposes, aspartame does not appear to be carcinogenic. For example,
❝The results of these studies showed no evidence that these sweeteners cause cancer or other harms in people.❞
~ NIH | National Cancer Institute
Source: Artificial Sweeteners and Cancer
Plenty of studies and reviews have also confirmed this; here are some examples:
- Evaluation of aspartame cancer epidemiology studies based on quality appraisal criteria
- Aspartame, low-calorie sweeteners and disease: Regulatory safety and epidemiological issues
- Aspartame: A review of genotoxicity data
Why then do so many people believe it causes cancer, despite all the evidence against it?
Well, there was a small study involving giving megadoses to rats, which did increase their cancer risk. So of course, the popular press took that and ran with it.
But those results have not been achieved outside of rats, and human studies great and small have all been overwhelmingly conclusive that moderate consumption of aspartame has no effect on cancer risk.
Aspartame is a neurotoxin: True or False?
False, again assuming moderate consumption. If you’re a rat being injected with a megadose, your experience may vary. But a human enjoying a diet soda, the aspartame isn’t the part that’s doing you harm, so far as we know.
For example, the European Food Safety Agency’s scientific review panel concluded:
❝there is still no substantive evidence that aspartame can induce such effects❞
~ Dr. Atkin et al (it was a pan-European team of 21 experts in the field)
Source: Report on the Meeting on Aspartame with National Experts
See also,
❝The data from the extensive investigations into the possibility of neurotoxic effects of aspartame, in general, do not support the hypothesis that aspartame in the human diet will affect nervous system function, learning or behavior.
The weight of existing evidence is that aspartame is safe at current levels of consumption as a nonnutritive sweetener.❞
and
❝The safety testing of aspartame has gone well beyond that required to evaluate the safety of a food additive.
When all the research on aspartame, including evaluations in both the premarketing and postmarketing periods, is examined as a whole, it is clear that aspartame is safe, and there are no unresolved questions regarding its safety under conditions of intended use.❞
Source: Regulatory Toxicology & Pharmacology | Aspartame: Review of Safety
Why then do many people believe it is a neurotoxin? This one can be traced back to a chain letter hoax from about 26 years ago; you can read it here, but please be aware it is an entirely debunked hoax:
Urban Legends | Aspartame Hoax
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
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