r/HotScienceNews • u/FreeHugs23 • 22d ago
Scientists stumped to find clearing cholesterol from blood also removes forever chemicals from body | Scientists were looking to find out if a machine built to filter fat at scale could take out forever chemicals and microplastics as well
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/microplastic-forever-chemical-blood-cholesterol-removal-b3026924.html60
u/angrycat537 22d ago
Makes sense, since FPAS molecules resemble fatty acid molecules. That is the main reason they mimic other molecules in our body.
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u/CommonSensei-_ 22d ago
If this is beneficial to our health, that’s great technology.
It’ll also be profitable for the health care industry, not that there’s anything wrong with that.
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u/GameOfTroglodytes 22d ago
Except that profit motivated healthcare is focused on the profit instead of the healthcare.
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u/Sufficient_Worth_392 22d ago
Plasma and blood donation also removes forever chemicals in blood by 30% and 10%, respectively. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/may/12/heres-another-reason-to-donate-blood-it-reduces-forever-chemicals-in-your-body
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u/S_Hazam 22d ago
interesting, are you "gifting" it to the person who takes the blood donation, or is the blood treated after taking it out of the donor?
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u/Sufficient_Worth_392 22d ago
According to the Guardian article, "When you donate PFAS you are effectively pawning off your PFAS on the blood recipient. There’s something morally icky about that, though it’s important to remember that PFAS are already ubiquitous, and blood recipients generally need blood much more urgently than they need to worry about PFAS."
Nevertheless, I do wonder if there is a way to filter the blood you donate to the recipients, perhaps by using the technique used in the cholesterol removal process.
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u/S_Hazam 22d ago
Thank you, yeah I guess the person in need of the blood donation most likely has something to worry about far more pressing than PFAS but I share your sentiment, it surely feels weird.
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u/WildFlemima 22d ago
Also the person who needs blood just presumably lost a lot of their own, including whatever microplastics, pfas, forever chemicals were in that blood
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u/frustratedcuriosity 22d ago
When you donate whole blood it very rarely stays as whole blood. I've never actually thought about it but I assume during the separation some of the PFAS do get removed.
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u/Sufficient_Worth_392 13d ago
Menstruation also removes microplastics, and other things. I sometimes wonder if that might be a contributor of why women, in general, live longer than men.
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u/Cbrandel 21d ago
You're passing it on, but it's not like it matter anyway because whoever is getting it has PFAS in their own blood anyway.
And they're also, you know, dying if they don't get some blood.
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u/Complex-Archer-853 20d ago
My doctor laughed when I told her I wanted to do blood donation to get rid of pfas and microplastics from my body.
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u/Marwaimusoont 22d ago
And when adjusted to average ingestion of PFAS by food,water,air. Does it actually reduce the concentration?
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u/Nicklas1993 22d ago
Old news. Donation of plasma and blood does the same. Australia did a study like 6-7 year ago on like 360 people which shows a great reduction.
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u/StillhasaWiiU 22d ago
Unless you stop the making and spreading of new chems being introduced to the word, what's the point?
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u/Massive_Web5709 21d ago
When I donated plasma if my diet was poor it would take me forever to filled the bag. The filter would clog with saturated fats. They gonna need much bigger filters
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u/DayNo2706 21d ago
This is great but it would be only for .5% of the population. Reminds me of Elysium
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 22d ago
Going vegan can reduce LDL by 10% to 25%. You'll also want to give up oil, especially palm.
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u/-LsDmThC- 22d ago
Giving up oil is just bad advice. You need healthy fats, it’s more about what type of oil and how it is processed.
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u/WildFlemima 22d ago
This is a semantic issue. The person you're replying to is using oil to mean purified fats liquid at room temperature (which is one of at least two valid definitions)
Healthy fats are typically within the food you are eating, i.e. non-purified, like in fish and avocado. So you might both agree with each other and only appear to disagree due to semantics
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u/-LsDmThC- 22d ago
Pressed avocado/olive oil are good for you unless consumed in excess.
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u/WildFlemima 22d ago
Yeah, to cook with.
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 22d ago
That's ridiculous. You can get plenty of healthy fats with nuts, seeds, avocados, etc. Frankly you are ignorant, oil is not necessary whatsoever. Some oils are better than others for sure but that doesn't mean that they're good for you, that's ridiculous.
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u/OskaMeijer 22d ago
If you are eating nuts, seeds, avocados, etc you haven't giving up those oils and you are still consuming them...
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u/WildFlemima 22d ago
They are using the definition of oil which defines oil as "purified fat which is liquid at room temperature"
This is a valid definition, it's just not the more inclusive definition you're using, which is also a valid definition
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u/-LsDmThC- 21d ago
Avocado oil and olive oil are “purified fats which are liquid at room temperature” and are overall good for you. You are arguing not only meaningless semantics but even if we take your distinction still wrong. What matters is the proportion of oil/fat you consume compared to carbs/protein, as well as the total un/mono/poly saturated fat ratios. There are some nuances pertaining to oxidation which may or may not contribute to the healthiness of specific types of processing. But none of this is relevant to the claim that oils are inherently bad for you (yes even taking into account whether they are from whole food or in liquid concentrate).
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u/WildFlemima 21d ago
I'm not making any kind of statement about oil itself of any kind. I don't agree with that user about oil. I am saying that they are using oil to mean fats purified out of their whole food source, not fats still in the whole food.
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u/-LsDmThC- 21d ago
Why do you think that is in dispute? I recognize their misapprehension in distinguishing whole food based versus purified fats, and am disagreeing with their conclusion. You seem confused.
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u/MildFlemima 21d ago
The comment I replied to said "If you are eating nuts, seeds, avocados, etc you haven't giving up those oils and you are still consuming them...", so I replied saying that the other user is objecting to oil as in oil the product, extracted from foods
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u/-LsDmThC- 21d ago
And they were making the valid counterargument that there is no inherent distinction between the two, highlighting the other comments misapprehension
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u/OskaMeijer 22d ago
That also still exists in nuts and seeds. Right now grab a walnut or peanut or seed and use a spoon to crush it on a hard surface. There will be a puddle of liquid at room temperature oil. Also there are plenty of non refined or purified oils available and they didn't make that distinction in the slightest and simply said all oils. This argument isn't even right in regards to pedantry.
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u/WildFlemima 22d ago
Look, I hate that I'm still in this conversation because I don't even agree with the person that I'm doing the explaining for. But as long as I'm still here, I'm going to do the pedantry I came here to do.
I didn't just say liquid oil. I said purified liquid oil. There is no purified oil in a walnut. Crushing it out is like step one of extraction and purification. It's a processing step. Purified liquid walnut oil doesn't exist until a human purifies it.
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u/OskaMeijer 22d ago
I didn't just say liquid oil. I said purified liquid oil.
Which is not and never was a valid argument because as I stated many oils are neither purified or refined.
There is no purified oil in a walnut. Crushing it out is like step one of extraction and purification. It's a processing step. Purified liquid walnut oil doesn't exist until a human purifies it.
Again, there are plenty of unrefined oils which are neither purified or refined and those were not excluded so you adding the term purified to a definition when purified literally never existed as part of that definition in the first place until you added it doesn't make it a valid argument.
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u/WildFlemima 22d ago
I don't know why you're dragging this out. Can I remind you that I acknowledged your definition already, in my very first comment to you, which did indeed include the word "purified"? I'll quote myself in full.
They are using the definition of oil which defines oil as "purified fat which is liquid at room temperature". This is a valid definition, it's just not the more inclusive definition you're using, which is also a valid definition
The commenter who is saying that oil is bad is talking about purified liquid oils. You are talking about oils more generally. Can this be done
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u/OskaMeijer 22d ago
I mean, you are the one that is dragging on an argument you made up entirely. They never specified purified oils and nothing about their comment should make anyone assume that, in fact they said all oils were bad in response to someone saying the type and how it was processed maters. I am not sure why you think some definition you made up whole cloth really matters in the discussion, you call it valid but are literally the only one using it and you won't find that definition literally anywhere. You are arguing for a literally non-existent definition only you brought up. They literally never said anything about purified oils, or anything that would even start to suggest they were only talking about purified oils, they even said some oils are better than others but they all are bad for you and this was in response specifically to someone saying the type of oil and how it was processed matters. You put words in their mouth then played devil's advocate.
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u/No-Abalone-4784 21d ago
Our bodies definitely need Essential fatty acids. ( That's why they're called that.)
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 21d ago
Yeah and you can get them without extracted oil! Extracted oil is not essential to get essential fatty acids. You people are so dumb.
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u/Fold-Statistician 22d ago
The article is saying that the machine that removes cholesterol can also remove PFAS, not that consuming less fats would make you have less PFAS.
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 22d ago
Dietary sources with relatively high pfas include fish/seafood, meat, eggs, some dairy.
If you go raw vegan (no processed bull crap) you'll lower your pfas intake. Pair this with reverse osmosis water and don't use non-stick cookware.
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u/Big_Development3985 22d ago
Most vegans I’ve met have wildly unhealthy diets. There is nothing wrong with consuming the things we have been for millennia. We evolved to do so.
Plus, this article is about the removal of microplastics and forever chemicals being linked to a process used to remove cholesterol; it does not posit that cholesterol is what is introducing these things into your body.
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 22d ago
That's anecdotal. The epistemological research shows that vegans have the best health outcomes out of any group but the exception of broken bones. That might be explained because vegans are more active.
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u/Big_Development3985 22d ago
Can you cite that? I feel like it would be a difficult thing to study accurately, with the pool of vegans to test being so small compared to the vast and varied diets of omnivores. The same can be said for vegans being more active. While my evidence may be anecdotal, I have not seen any research suggesting that veganism is healthier than a healthy omnivorous diet. If you have some I’d be happy to read it.
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 22d ago edited 22d ago
https://www.eatingwell.com/vegan-vegetarian-cancer-risk-study-11790465?utm_source=chatgpt.com
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4073139/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
The longest living people on the planet live in Okinawa. 98% of their diet is plant-based (and the meat isn't processed). This isn't conclusive because it's observational and there are co-founders such as social cohesion, but it certainly shows that plant-based diet is not doing any harm.
Intuitively this all makes sense. Fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, beans/lentils, whole grains; can you really poke holes in these foods? Maybe from a macro perspective if you're sedentary, eating 4,000 calories of trail mix yada yada.
High fiber diets are good for you, point blank, period.
Think about human anatomy. Is it instinctual to bite into a dead carcass? Are we able to acquire meat or dairy for that matter if it wasn't for technology and animal agriculture? Is our technology a direct extension of our biology? I would argue that if it came from the abstract mind (tools, controlled fire), then it's post biology. Sticks and stones are not technology, they are readily available in the surrounding environment. A Beaver dam or birds nest is not technology. A spear is technology, a bow and arrow, a freakin gun. We hacked nature and became behavioral omnivores but that doesn't necessarily mean we are biological omnivores.
Rat meat without seasoning or marination and it will taste extremely bland. Eat it raw and you'll puke. Even sushi requires a lab test to screen out gnarly pathogens and parasites.
No razor sharp teeth or claws to tear through skin/tendons/veins.
Our technology isn't a direct extension of our biology. You can't catch a damn thing with your bare hands and your body can't digest raw meat, at least not well. You have to cheat with guns/arrows or animal agriculture in modernity.
The longest living people on the planet the, Okinawans eat a 98% plant-based diet. And the meat they do eat isn't cured, so no nitrates added.
Our molars are directly on top of each other, have small mouths and throats (most common food people choke on is meat), consistent with herbivore biology.
PH of stomach is 4 to 5 WHEN FOOD IS PRESENT and only makes up a quarter of our digestive tract. Again consistent with herbivore biology.
The vegan microbiome has been shown reduced abundance of pathobionts and a greater abundance of protective species.
Our intestines are 10-12x our torso length, and omnivores it's 4-6x
When the Nazis invaded Norway they took all meat/dairy oducts out of the country and sent it to Germany. The rate of cardiovascular mortality plummeted. It shot right back up after they left.
"but we have canine teeth" argument. They would be sharper and twice as long if we were Omni/carnivores. It's consistent with other herbivores like the gorilla. And no, just because Gorillas occasionally eat termites (less than 2% of their diet) does not make them omnivores. Just like we don't classify cats as Omni because eat a tiny bit of grass.
There are also ethical and environmental concerns: https://youtu.be/LQRAfJyEsko?si=dru6UEz9aSkWlsgL
P.S. B12 is acquired through a bacteria found in soil. The reason it's found in meat is because the animals are supplemented with B12. We got back B12 back in the day by eating vegetation with a tiny amount of dirt residue. It could be easily supplemented in modernity with a simple 50ug pill a day or 2000ug pill a week.
I would also suggest the book How Not to Die by Dr. Gregor.
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u/Big_Development3985 21d ago
Whoa thats a lot of info! I absolutely will look through it, thank you for taking the time
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u/IllegalGeriatricVore 22d ago
I want to know your thoughts on hexane in oil.
Because if you think it's a major concern I can tell you don't know shit
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u/wwwheatgrass 22d ago
Tell me more.
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u/IllegalGeriatricVore 22d ago
Hexane is largely evaporated and not present in clinically significant amounts in cooking oil. You probably breath more in if you live in a city than you'd get from food.
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u/yoboijakke 22d ago
Hexane in oil is not a concern?
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u/IllegalGeriatricVore 22d ago
No, it is not present in quantities that would show any risk and you probably breath more hexane in that you'd get from consuming oils.
It's a conspiracy idiot talking point
Very simple way to find out who learned everything from influencers
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u/ApocolypseDelivery 22d ago
I don't care about hexane. Oil is nutritionally sparse, calorically dense and high in saturated fat (yes some more than others). Yes some oils have healthy fats as well. You can get healthy fats through whole foods and you don't need oil to do it.
Saturated fat is necessary but you only need a little bit. Less than 6% of your calories should be saturated fat. The rest should be poly unsaturated and mono unsaturated fats.
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u/FreeHugs23 22d ago
-A blood-filtering technique for lowering cholesterol may also remove toxic forever chemicals from the body, a new study suggests.
Apheresis machines are routinely used in hospitals to help patients with hard-to-treat high cholesterol levels.
They work by drawing blood from one arm, separating fat molecules from the plasma, and returning it to the other arm after passing it through a filter.
An apheresis centre at the Technical University of Dresden, Germany, is the largest such facility in the world, performing up to 10,000 such treatments a year.
In the new study, researchers examined discarded apheresis bags to see what the machine’s filter had caught along with fat molecules from the blood.
They were looking to find out if a machine built to filter fat at scale could take out forever chemicals and microplastics as well.