Photo courtesy of Ohio Sea Grant Associate Professors David Kennedy, left, and Steven Haller study how emergent chemicals like microplastics and “forever chemicals” could affect people with pre-existing conditions.
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Research: Preexisting health problems can worsen effects of exposure to toxins in Great Lakes

By Jim Bloch

Thanks to invasive zebra and quagga mussels, the Great Lakes- the world’s largest surface area of fresh water- are more evident now than ever. But that’s not necessarily good because the mussels strip nutrients, such as plankton and algae, from the water that native fish, such as whitefish, rely on to thrive.

Thanks to the Clean Water and Great Lakes Restoration Acts, the water in the lakes is probably in better shape than it has been in the last century.

But that doesn’t mean everything in the lakes is hunky dory.

Emergent chemicals of concern refer to newer and less well-understood contaminants in the lakes, such as PFAS, microscopic bits of plastics, and pharmaceuticals.

According to researchers at the University of Toledo, the effects of these emergent chemicals are worse on people with preexisting health conditions than on healthy people.

The researchers, associate professors David Kennedy and Steven Haller, noted how people with Type 2 diabetes fared when exposed to these new chemicals of concern.

They “found that pre-existing conditions, such as Type 2 diabetes, could increase susceptibility to the toxins,” according to a story in Ohio Sea Grant in July called “Detecting Differences” by Joan Slattery Wall.

Ohio Sea Grant helped to fund the research. The program is headquartered at Ohio State University in Columbus, OH, and operates the research center at Stone Lab in Lake Erie. It’s part of NOAA Sea Grant, a network of 34 Sea Grant Programs dedicated to the protection and sustainable use of marine and Great Lakes resources.

Three emergent chemicals studied by Kennedy and Haller were perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, polystyrene nanoplastics and 17α-ethynylestradiol or EE2.

Emergent chemicals of concern

PFOA makes products that resist heat, fire, oil, stains, grease and water. It is one of huge family of chemicals call per- and poly fluoroalkyl substances or PFAS. PFAS are known as a “forever chemicals” because they do not break down in the environment or in the human body. PFOA, an ingredient in Teflon nonstick pans, has been linked to “high cholesterol, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, testicular cancer, kidney cancer and pregnancy induced hypertension,” according to a Aug. 20 story in the New York Times Magazine.

Great Lakes Now, a news aggregation site for the lakes, speculates that PFAS is “likely present in all major water supplies.”

Polystyrene nanoplastics are super-tiny bits of larger plastics that have abraded or broken off more significant pieces of plastic, such as resin pellets used for plastic manufacturing or microbeads, the tiny plastic beads used in cosmetics, shampoos, and other beauty products. Studies suggest that plastic nanoparticles may bio-accumulate and cause “physical stress and damage, apoptosis, necrosis, inflammation, oxidative stress, and immune responses which could be associated with the development of cancer,” according to a June study in Frontiers about nanoplastics in food.

“Researchers have found stunningly high amounts of tiny plastic pieces in all five Great Lakes, which provide drinking water for 40 million people,” according to the Great Lakes Alliance. “They’ve found microplastics in Great Lakes fish, drinking water, bottled water, and beer.”

EE2 is “a synthetic hormone used in medications for humans as well as livestock and aquaculture activity and that contaminates raw and treated wastewater,” according to the study.

A 2014 study in Environmental International found that EE2 is highly resistant to breaking down in the environment; it tends to absorb organic matter, accumulate in sediment, and bio-concentrate. It can alter sex determination, delay sexual maturity, and “decrease the secondary sexual characteristics of exposed organisms even at a low concentration.”

The results

Livers and kidneys function to eliminate toxins from human bodies before they can cause harm.

Haller and Kennedy “found that in cells from liver and kidney biopsies, forever chemicals suppressed the immune response, nanoplastics increased inflammation and residual pharmaceuticals increased markers of kidney injury,” according to the article. “In cells from patients with diabetes, those results were more pronounced, indicating those patients may be more susceptible to and have greater damage from the toxins.”

The researchers biopsied the livers and kidneys of patients with and without diabetes to examine the impact of the trio of chemicals on the body.

The pair noted how common diabetes has become, striking 37.3 million Americans or 11.3% of the nation, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Worldwide, nearly seven million people died of the disease in 2021.

“This common disease has well-known impacts on how both the liver and kidney perform their metabolic functions, including the detoxification of impurities in our body,” Haller said in a statement.

“It is important to understand whether this common disease also affects the way our body handles these specific chemicals of concern, and if so, to understand the ways that this occurs,” said Kennedy in a statement. “This information will help us design targeted ways to help with prevention, diagnosis and treatment of exposure to these toxins not only in healthy populations but also in vulnerable and at-risk populations such as those with Type 2 diabetes… In diabetes, where you have a metabolic disorder, those pathways are already altered or dysregulated. When you add these chemicals on top, they further disturb those pathways, including” storing fat instead of metabolizing it. When that happens, the organs cannot properly clean the body of toxins. “The liver and kidney are not meant to store fat. If your liver cells start to store fat, then it’s like you’re taking your Formula 1 race car designed to run fast races and turning it into a U-Haul moving van.”

The researchers said that using human subjects instead of animal subjects made the research directly relevant to impact of the new chemicals in the lakes to human health.

“As much as we can, we’re going to take human cells closer to an actual living, moving, breathing organ,” Kennedy said. “It gives us good data where we’re not 12 steps removed from reality. It’s a lot more applicable.”

Jim Bloch is a freelance writer based in St. Clair, Michigan. Contact him at bloch.jim@gmail.com.

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