Learning English

Is there plastic in your blood?

A recent study published in the journal Environment International found plastic particles in blood samples in 80% of people tested.

The effects of microplastics in the body aren’t known – but researchers said the new results are concerning and that microplastics could damage human cells.

Neil and Roy look at the vocabulary used in the headlines about this story.

Watch the video and complete the activity

NEWS REVIEW PODCAST NOW AVAILABLE - SUBSCRIBE HERE

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Did you like that? Why not try these?

• Air pollution takes three years off life: BBC News Review
• affect vs effect - English In A Minute
• Differences between formal and informal English

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The story

A study found plastic particles in blood samples in 80% of 22 people tested.

The study was published in the journal Environment International, and the results were first reported by the newspaper, The Guardian. These findings suggest that plastic particles might have the ability to move around the human body and enter organs.

The effects of microplastics in the body aren’t known – but researchers said the new results are concerning and that microplastics could damage human cells.

Key words and phrases

filtered out
removed completely

• We tried to filter out the background noise in the video edit.
• The survey decided to filter out people from lower age groups as they weren’t important to the findings.

adverse effects
negative and harmful consequences

• The adverse effects of the new medication will be studied.
• Due to adverse weather conditions, no trains will be running.

key risks
most significant potential dangers

• The potentially faulty steering was seen as a key risk.
• I thought his key points in the speech weren’t important.

To do

Try our quiz to see how well you've learned today's language.

Downloads

You can download the audio and PDF document for this episode.

More

We hope you enjoyed News Review. You can find more episodes here.