The Dr. Josh Axe Show - Reverse Microplastic Toxicity NATURALLY (Heals Mitochondria, Gut, Brain) | Dr. Josh Axe

Starting point is 00:00:00 The average person consumes one credit card a day in microplastics. The receipts you get, that ink on there is loaded with forever chemicals and microplastics. Teflon pants. I mean, these things are leaching, microplastics, major, major chemicals, forever chemicals that damage your entire body. And that's disrupting your hormones. It's increasing your cancer risk. Almost every health condition you can think of. The University of Newcastle study found the average person, consumes five grams of plastic every seven days. The exact weight of a credit card. And if you've

Starting point is 00:00:50 watched the plastic detox on Netflix, maybe you've already seen this, but six couples were struggling with infertility. They did 90 days of removing plastics and doing a plastic detox. They repaired their bodies and the groups there got pregnant. That's not a coincidence. Here's a reality, microplastics are destroying our bodies. And here are some other statistics that are are somewhat shocking. Okay. When we go and study a human brain, all right? There is a spoon's worth, a full spoon, imagine that, worth of plastic in the brain.

Starting point is 00:01:24 When they studied men, they found that every single human male had plastic actually in their testicles, every single one. And microplastics are also found in our arteries. By the way, if you have higher levels of microplastics in your arteries and blood, you're You have a 450% higher risk of a heart attack, a stroke, or early death. So getting micropastics out of your body and not being exposed to them is one of the key things you can do for longevity and curing any health problem. Now, they're even finding microplastics in the umbilical cords of babies.

Starting point is 00:02:05 And that blood being passed from a mother to a child. So there are so many toxins that we are being exposed to. but microplastics might be the worst offender. And one area of your body that is heavily harmed by microplastics is your gut lining. Okay, microplastics essentially are punching holes through your gut lining, causing a condition called leaky gut or intestinal permeability. And a 2023 study published in Cell Reports Medicine found that nanoplastic exposure triggers leaky gut within 14 days. And that's how plastic gets from your stomach, by the way, into your

Starting point is 00:02:45 bloodstream, is it actually punches a hole through your intestines, gets into your bloodstream, and then it causes inflammation throughout your entire body. Now listen to this study. Babies are born pre-polluted. 100% of placentists tested in 2021 were contaminated with microplastics, okay? And so we see this, as I mentioned before, we see babies being exposed very early on. There are 20 times more plastic in infant feces than adults. And 39% of breast milk samples contained microplastics. This is according to another medical study. A 2025 Baylor medicine study found significantly higher levels of microplastics in pre-term bursts as well. So it might be contributing to early births in children. And so this isn't just an adult and later on in life

Starting point is 00:03:41 issue. A lot of us have been exposed since we were kids. I mean, I think back about all the plastic containers I've drank out of, you know, every soccer practice, you know, drinking the, first off, not even the artificial chemicals and the flavorings and the food dives that I got in, you know, things like Gatorade. But, I mean, I was drinking out of plastic bottles all day, every day, plastic spoons. I mean, constantly exposed. to plastics. But most people don't realize how damaging it is to our bodies. And I want to walk you through how plastics wreck the gut. Okay. One thing they do is they damage two types of species of probiotics called acrimancia and lactobacillus, and they deplete them in the body. This disrupts

Starting point is 00:04:23 then your tight junctions, and there's something called an LPS endotoxin spike. So then basically, a lot of these plastics, it's almost like they're leaking toxins. They destroy good bacteria. They then damage the gut lining, and then they make your gut more friendly to pathogens like parasites or H. Pylora or Candida to live there and take the place of the good bacteria that you need to have in order to absorb nutrients and to not have food sensitivities and to overall have a strong immune system. And so number one, plastics destroy your gut health. Here's another thing they destroy. They destroy your reproductive health. In a study, Dr. Shanna Swan discovered male sperm count has dropped 50% in the last 50 years.

Starting point is 00:05:13 And in a 2024 study, microplastics were found in 100% of human testicles tested. Okay, men with the highest fallate exposure had 50% lower testosterone. They had the lowest testosterone late. So if you are exposed to phallates, microplastics, these chemicals, that means you will have lower testosterone, according to the study. it's causing major toxicity issues, and it will then cause testosterone to plummet in men. And also, it's an issue for women. And the reason why this is such a big issue for hormonal health is, is that these

Starting point is 00:05:46 microplastics, like D-EHP and DBP and BBP, they act as xenoestrogens. Okay, they act as sort of these fake estrogens in the body. And so what this does for women is it elevates your estrogen. So estrogen goes up, progesterone actually gets pushed down even further. So now there's this big gap here. And when estrogen goes up, that then actually imbalances the conversion of T4 to T3, so it throws off your thyroid hormones. But it also throws off your estradiol and your progesterone, which greatly increases your risk of things like PCOS, endometriosis, fertility decline, early menopausal symptoms, and early perimenopause. It makes

Starting point is 00:06:29 your menopausal symptoms much worse. And it actually ages your body. You get moved into aging prematurely. And some of the places these hide, of course we talked about the plastic containers, plastic bottles, but also the fragrances and perfumes. Binal flooring, plastic wrap, personal care products, microplastics are not just in what you think of as plastic containers. They are hidden all over the place. In fact, they're even found, you know the receipts you get when you check out of the grocery store, that ink there on the little sheet of paper on your receipt, that has been shown. That's a form of BPA and it's absorbed in the skin in 90 seconds. So if they ask you, do you want a receipt next time to say pass or send me an email, that's a much better

Starting point is 00:07:18 option because even that is greatly lowering testosterone in men, causing estrogen to go high in women, which is a big causative factor of estrogen-based. cancers like breast cancer. Cancer, dementia, heart disease, they're coming for so many people. And it's not just because of what most people think, which is that it's bad luck or bad genetics. The truth is your daily choices are either creating health or setting the stage for disease and your doctor is probably reading your blood work all wrong.

Starting point is 00:07:53 They're missing the cellular issues behind the symptoms. I'm currently offering a simple at-home blood test. that actually test for the right things. And just as importantly, it comes with proper interpretation of the results. This new test flips the script. The future of interpreting test results is here. If you want to check it out and grab one before they're gone, just go to mybloodwork.com now.

Starting point is 00:08:18 So here's the reality. Your hormone imbalances. It might not be genetic. Your tiredness might not be related to your adrenal glands or even cortisol. It might be plastic poisoning your power plant to the mitochondria in your cells. In fact, nanoplastics reduce mitochondrial membrane potential by 35%. Okay, that's where your body creates ATP and cellular energy. This is also a major causative factor for anyone with hypothyroidism, chronic fatigue syndrome,

Starting point is 00:08:51 or just general fatigue, if you're saying to yourself, you know what, I am more tired than I should be, right? And you're in the afternoon and you're tired, you wake up tired, or you're you're, you're you're just exhausted by the end of the day, microplastics contribute. And it's causing a mitochondrial meltdown. Nanoplastics cross what we call your mitochondrial membrane. So they actually get inside, not only the cell, okay, you've got a cell membrane, they actually pass into your cell membrane, then they actually pass through the mitochondrial membrane and actually inside the mitochondria.

Starting point is 00:09:24 And what this does is it causes oxidative stress. you go into a machine, and then it just starts wrecking and damaging things everywhere, throwing everything off. So it literally is causing your mitochondria to crumbling fall apart. And again, this is a big causative factor. I mentioned hypothyroidism and chronic fatigue and general low energy, but also this is going to contribute to brain fog. Long COVID, you know, if you're exposed to long COVID, some people were exposed to COVID and they fell awful for two weeks, and then they were fine and had zero symptoms whatsoever. I was one of those people.

Starting point is 00:09:58 I had no symptoms after COVID. It felt just fine. There are some people now, years later, that are still exhausted. And if you were already had a 35%, 50% damage inside your mitochondria from excess plastic exposure, and then you have an issue like a virus come along, well, now your body was so, it's just easy to break down your body. It's sort of like if you're lifting weights and maybe you can handle a couple plates on each side, but then somebody puts a couple more plates on and your body just buckles and crashes.

Starting point is 00:10:29 That's what's happening to your mitochondria. And this is where taking supplements like N80 plus, CO-10, PQQQ, you know, certain B vitamins, I mean, these nutrients are critically important for mitochondrial function. But if you don't go and get rid of the plastics, exposures and detox the plastics, oftentimes your body can never fully recover. Now, here's the most important thing of all. It's longevity, living a long, healthy life. And a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, one of the most prestigious medical journals in the world. They did a study on arterial health and the health of heart and bloodstream on mortality. This study was done on 257 patients over 34 months. This is a study done in

Starting point is 00:11:18 24. Here's what they found. Micropastic exposure, when it's the highest in people, increases your risk of dying by 450%. That's 5.4.5 times. It's a higher risk of a heart attack, a stroke, in early death, when they found microplastic specifically in your carotid artery plaque. So here's where it becomes really deadly. You expose yourself to microplastics. You also have inflammation in your in your body, like high CRP levels. It could be you have an inflammatory diet or an autoimmune disease or some sort of issue, joint pain, but there's inflammation happening. Then you have plastic exposure that gets lodged in the arterial plaque. Your chance of mortality goes up dramatically. And so we know that microplastics, they damage your gut, they damage your cells in the area of

Starting point is 00:12:11 mitochondria, they also damage your brain. Researchers analyzed 91 human brains and found microplastic concentrations averaging a plastic spoons worth in that 91 people. Now here's a kicker. They did this study before in 2016. They did it again in 2024. There's an eight year difference between two studies they did on the amount of plastics found in the average person's brain. in 2024, they found 50% more plastic on average than in 2016, just eight years earlier. Okay, 50% more. So this means that we are exposed to way more plastic now than we even were eight years ago. And what happens is our blood-brain barriers, very similar to our gut lining, okay, you can have a leaky gut, you can also have a leaky brain barrier.

Starting point is 00:13:04 And it acts like a chain link fence, like keeping certain things out. But when you tear a hole in it, which is what happens, these microplastics, they actually go to the brain. Heavy metals do a very similar thing. Heavy metals, microplastics, certain toxins, they go and they can damage that blood brain barrier. And especially nanoplastics, some of these are so small. They're almost like bugs or a virus. They get through the blood brain barrier. They start to cause and increase your symptoms. They can increase brain fog symptoms. I also believe they can be closely connected into issues like MS and dementia and any sort of neuroinflammatory illness, microplastics could be at the root of it.

Starting point is 00:13:44 All right, so I want to walk you through the biggest microplastic offenders that are in your kitchen right now. And a lot of them are really surprising. Here's a big one, teabacks. A lot of these teabacks say this one here in particular, this has microplastics in it. Okay, so if you're doing a lot of these teabags, if you're buying herbal tea, I'm talking about peppermint or camomile or ginger or any type of tea, and it doesn't say microplastic free, BPA-free, free of chemicals.

Starting point is 00:14:12 This is leaching into your body at super high levels. So tea bags, one of the worst offenders of microplastics. Now, listen, I want to encourage you drink lots of tea. But just make sure to drink loose-leaf tea or buy tea where they don't have these plastics in the actual tea bags themselves. And then another big one is water, right? We know bottled water leaches a lot of. of plastic chemicals into water supply. So switch to stainless steel, switch to glass. Cardboard is probably

Starting point is 00:14:39 a better option as well. If you're traveling around, stay away from the plastic. And I would say also getting a water filter, right? One of the most toxic things in your home is your water that's city water. And so getting a burkey or a roar or a reverse osmosis filter, a great idea. But I would say the biggest finish, water and tea are two of the biggest that you want to stay away from. Next up are plastic cutting boards. Think about every time you are cutting an onion, cutting vegetables, doing anything on here, they're leaking microplastics into your food. Much better option. Do a water, one of my favorites, bamboo cutting board. It's a great option here. So bamboo cutting board, much, much better option. This is what we use in the Axe household. This is a brand I really like

Starting point is 00:15:23 Karaway, so you could try them. Good option there. And then a few others, Teflum Pants. I mean, these things are leaching, microplastics. major, major chemicals, forever chemicals that damage your entire body causing estrogen, go high, testosterone low, damaging your hormones. So staying away from these. And of course, switching over to a couple of my favorites, stainless steel. You can also do cast iron. That's a great option. You see, we've got the cast iron here.

Starting point is 00:15:53 And if you don't like kind of the heaviness of the cast iron, I love that. But if you want something a little lighter but also really effective, you can do ceramic. This is another, this is Brand Caraway again. These are great options here to use. And then I want to go, here's a big one. And by the way, I'm guilty of this. I have used a Vitamix for over 20 years now. And I've used the plastic container up until two years ago,

Starting point is 00:16:14 almost two years ago, a little over a year and a half ago. I switched over to there's now a stainless steel Vitamix top that you can buy and use with your Vitamix. Or if you have a blender at home, you could buy a glass top. Or if you don't have a blender, buy one that has stainless steel or glass as the top. But think about this. A lot of people have had these plastic containers for one, five, 10, 20 years. I've had mine for over 10 years.

Starting point is 00:16:39 My blender, and these plastics is using them in the dishwasher. They blend. Think on high speed. They're leaching microplastics. And every time you're trying to make a healthy smoothie, it's leaching into your smoothie, your superfood smoothie. It's now a super microplastic smoothie. That's one of the problems.

Starting point is 00:16:55 So switching out for a stainless steel option or a glass option is something you absolutely want to do. And then a few other things here. Here's some surprising ones around the house. Baby toys have a lot of microplastics in them, okay? And kids are putting in the mouth or chewing on them. So, and of course, you know, kids are eating all kinds of plastic stuff, right? Plastic baby balls. Anytime you could switch to glass or BPA-free or or stainless steel, a better option and wood toys. I mean, just trying to stay away from a lot of plastics, especially when you have infants that are putting it in their mouth, those are the most important ages. Okay, for your kids to be building with Legos, of course, those are plastic.

Starting point is 00:17:37 It's not as big of a deal because they're just touching it with their hands and fingers and that's it. But putting it in their mouth, that's where it really becomes an issue. And there's a few other things I want to mention here. Of course, the containers you're using at home, right? The plastic containers. Switching over to glass is that, now listen, the lid's not that important. Your food's not touching the lid. The lid can be plastic or rubber or whatever.

Starting point is 00:17:58 is, but you do want this part to be glass, especially if you'd ever heat it up. That's where it becomes really important as well. And then a few others here, just kitchen utensils, right? All of these sort of things switch out for for wood. Much better options. I showed you here, these are great options here for these containers. So this is glass here. Now, it's plastic top. That's fine. Again, your food's not constantly touching that or you're not heating up the plastic top, but glass here is a great option here. So that can be a good option there. That's another great caraway product. Again, your cups, you know, measuring cups, rather than plastic using metal. There, that's good. And oh, here's a big one. Here's the last one that I want to show.

Starting point is 00:18:38 But I'm not even going to pick this up. It's so toxic. Okay. This is a receipt. All right. The receipts you get from the grocery store, from the convenience store, from whatever shop you're going to, department store, that ink on there is loaded with forever chemicals and microplastics, something called phallates. This has been shown in clinical studies to greatly decrease testosterone in men, throw off the estrogen in women. It's a major hormone disruptor. This is connected to that microplastic family when we look at this phallates. So you want to stay completely away from microplastics. This is one of the absolute worst defenders there. By the way, one of the big things these micropastics do is they leach into your cells, they damage your mitochondria. So do everything

Starting point is 00:19:25 you can to get rid of the receipts and the chemicals and the microplastics in order to heal your cells. And if you want to learn more about how to heal your cells and detoxify your body at the cellular level, hey, I recorded an advanced webinar where I walk you through exactly how to heal your cells, heal your hormones, detoxify your whole body using foods, herbs, and lifestyle medicine. So if you want to learn how to heal yourself in depth, don't miss this webinar training. You can click the link below to watch that advanced. training on how to heal your cells, heal your hormones through the power of cellular detoxification. When it comes to your kitchen items, just make some of the simple swaps. Here's the big ones,

Starting point is 00:20:07 okay? Change out your water filter. Get a good water filter. Stop drinking out of plastic water bottles. Try and switch those over to glass or stainless steel. Switch over some of your cookware. I mean, if you could just do those things alone, it's going to make a major difference in you getting, reducing your exposure to microplastics, because we talked about this, the average person consumes the average of one credit card a day in microplastics. And that's disrupting your hormones. It's increasing your cancer risk. Almost every health condition you can think of. And so if you can eliminate your exposure number one and then follow a diet to get rid of the microplastics as well, you're going to be so much healthier and happier for it. And by the way, one of the questions

Starting point is 00:20:49 I always get is Dr. Axe, hey, what are brands and products? I can trust or I should buy that I can replace the plastic with. Listen, there are quite a few good brands out there, but one I personally use and really like is Caraway. I mentioned them earlier. I mean, they've got all kinds of great products. They literally have cutting boards. Those are Carraway, the utensils, the storage containers, the cutting board, all of it is

Starting point is 00:21:12 Carraway. So Caraway is a great brand. They do stainless steel. They do ceramic. They do wood. They do natural non-toxic ingredients. They specialize in organic, non-toxic products. and you can go on their website because I've purchased from them and because I like to support them,

Starting point is 00:21:28 you can go and get 10% off. I think if you enter my full name, it's Dr. Josh Axe. If you enter that on their site, you'll get, I believe, an extra 10% discount. And when you bundle their products together, I think it's 20% discount. So you can get a really big discount on their products when you go to caraway.com and enter the code Dr. Joshax on checkout there for a discount there. But again, there's a lot of great brands, but this is one I personally love. and recommend and use if you want to know one of the best brands here to help you go microplastic free and toxin-free in your kitchen. Now, in addition to the kitchen, there are some really hidden sources that I think even when I heard them surprised me. Number one, I mentioned this,

Starting point is 00:22:07 receipts. Number two is this, cheap HVAC filters. Think about this. The air in your home can be filled with microplastics with just regular HVAC filters. But you have, that's supposed to be cleansing your air, can be releasing microplastics. The third one is this, personal protective equipment, masks like the N95s, they actually will shed microplastics early on in using them. And here's the fourth one, synthetic clothing, especially athletic clothing. You know those skin-tight, you know, joggers that people are wearing today, those contain microplastics. So like your $128 yoga pants, they are. shedding plastic into your skin every time you exercise and sweat. In fact, Dr. Shannon Swan in the

Starting point is 00:22:59 plastic detox said that your skin absorbs about 60% of what you put on. So polyester, athleisure, releases up to 700,000 microfibers per wash. So you're not just wearing plastic. You are absorbing it. And again, polyester is one of the biggest offenders. And listen to some of these brands, Lulu Lemon, it's like 86% nylon and polyester. Okay, so when you're wearing those skin tight leggings from Lulu Lemon, that can be leaching plastic into your body, Athleta, okay? Or Nike, their dry fit products, or underarm, or even aloe yoga, right? So here's what happens. You sweat, you have heat, and you have friction, okay? That can drive those microplastics even deeper into your body. And here's what you want to change to. Actually, this is what I'm wearing

Starting point is 00:23:53 now is I am wearing wool. Okay. Every time I wear underwear, pants, socks, everything I wear, for the most part is wool or organic cotton. Now listen, I think bamboo can be okay. Linen. There are some other good materials, but for myself, marina wool, organic cotton are the things I personally use the most, a little bamboo here and there. But the organic cotton and wool is really what you want to look into and switch over to. Hey guys, I'm here with my good friend Dr. Dave Jockers. In fact, we've been friends for more than 20 years. He runs the podcast, the Dr. Dave Jockers' functional nutrition podcast.

Starting point is 00:24:34 Dr. Dave, tell us a little bit about what your podcast is about. Yeah, absolutely. We dive deep on functional nutrition, really how to personalize your nutrition plan for better energy, mental clarity, better hormone balance. And we talk a lot about cellular health, mitochondrial function. cell membrane. We do a deep dive on every major nutrition topic and natural health topic. So everything you need right there at your fingertips, Dr. Jocker's Functional Nutrition Podcast. I want to encourage you run out and listen to the Dr. Jocker show. Again, I'm a big fan of it.

Starting point is 00:25:05 I think you will be as well. Now, I know something that a lot of doctors talk about is how toxic our environment is. And obviously I spent some time doing that, talking about microplastics. But now I want to get into the details of how do you actually detox? If you've been exposed to microplastics, if you have low testosterone, if your estrogen's too high, if you know that toxicity is part of your issue, if you have any of the symptoms we've talked about related to toxicity, what can you start to do? Well, I want to walk you through my seven-step detox protocol of what to do in order to get these toxins out of your system. And so the seven-step protocol is this. Eliminate, filter, sweat, bind, use glutathione, support your bile, use fiber,

Starting point is 00:25:51 that's really supporting more of your liver and your gallbladder there and then potentially fasting. So number one, of course, is eliminate your exposure. I mean, that is the first thing that we need to do is eliminate and filter. So again, what I would just do, listen, go in your kitchen and take all the plastic containers, the plastic water bottles, the plastic everything, and just swap it out for stainless steel and glass and ceramic and bamboo cutting boards. I mean, just make those natural holistic switches. Okay, similar thing. I mean, maybe look at it. I mean, maybe look at at, listen, I'm not telling you you've got to change all your clothes right away, but maybe next time you buy clothes, you just be more conscious of, hey, can I get this in cotton or can I do

Starting point is 00:26:30 marino wool? Those are better options. Number two is filter your water. Listen, you don't have to go and get a whole house filter. Just your drinking water, get a reverse osmosis or a solid carbon block filter, like, you know, or something like a burkey or a roar, but get a good quality water filter for your drinking water that removes, you know, most of the time these are going to remove 90% or 99% of microplastics. Okay, so that's what I would encourage you to do for step number two, because with a study show, listen, you're constantly drinking water, constantly, you're using it in everything, and there are microplastics and other toxins we didn't even mention in there as well. Number three, try and sweat a couple days a week. This is why

Starting point is 00:27:14 infrared sauna, one of the reasons why I'm such a big fan and there are so many benefits. infrared sonnas help you sweat, help you detox, getting rid of some of these chemicals. In fact, the Mayo Clinic has said, sweat is confirmed for the elimination of phallates in BPA. So we know that actually sweating does help your body detox. Now, you can also go and cycle or run or work out to the point where you're sweating, and that's fantastic too. But infrared sauna laying out in the sun, those are also wonderful. And then when you're doing this, of course, rehydrate. with water and maybe some electrolytes and water that's filtered. Okay, number four is this.

Starting point is 00:27:56 If you're going to do a detox, use a binder, but on a regular basis, use light binders. What light binders are, you know, activated charcoal is a very strong binder. You typically don't want to do that for more than a month because it is so strong. And for a lot of people, it'll cause constipation over time. Clay is a step down from it. It's a strong binder, not quite as strong, but that can cause some issues. You can take clay a little bit longer.

Starting point is 00:28:19 But you can take mild binders. Fiber would be in that category, up in your fiber intake. Specific types of fiber like modified citrus pectin. This is often used as well in cancer protocols, major benefits, because it will detox and bind and pull things out of your body while not causing constipation. Chlera, zeolites, fulvic and humic acid found in things like chelagin. These natural organic binders are great options.

Starting point is 00:28:47 and they're often best taken between meals, though some of these more natural ones you could take it with a meal. But I would do it either right before bed, first thing in the morning, or between meals if you're going to take one of these natural binders I mentioned. And then the number five would be this, support glutathione in your body. Glutothion is your master antioxidant. It is what's going to support your detoxification system. Think about it like this.

Starting point is 00:29:14 In order to support your muscles, You want to eat muscle meat, right? So you want to eat a chicken breast or, or, you know, a filet mignon beef. You want to support that organ. In order to support the liver and your cellular detoxification system, you really want to boost your glutathion levels. And this is where taking the precursor to glutathione and acetyl cysteine, NAC, is fantastic.

Starting point is 00:29:42 You can do 600 to 900 milligrams two to three times daily. Sulfurane from broccoli sprouts are just eating. Eating sprouts, major benefits, you know, the sprouts that you put in sandwiches or on a salad, those have compounds that are tremendously beneficial. Herbs like milk thistle, really great for glutathione support. And then liposomal glutathione is also great. But you want to support glutathione if you were going to do a micro plastic detox or any type of detox. Number six is up your fiber and your bile flow.

Starting point is 00:30:13 Now I mentioned modified citrus pectin. in addition, eat flax and chia seeds. You could take some cillium husk fiber. Acacia fiber is also great. And then herbs. Herbs that are bitter tend to support bioflow. So drinking dandelion tea, doing some artichoke as a tincter or burdock. I mean, these have major, major benefits there, of course, along with the milk thistle

Starting point is 00:30:40 of supporting bioflow in the body. And then you can do some fasting, even if you can do some fasting, even if it's one day a week, like skipping breakfast and lunch as the early church did, that's a great option. But doing a fast periodically can be beneficial. Now listen, if you are weak and you're tired and you don't have great health, doing intense fast is not a good idea. You really want to stick to those three meals a day, getting a lot of fruits, vegetables, organic meat, bone broth, those types of foods. But if you are generally healthy and not weak and you're not depleted with a condition like hypothyroidism or chronic fatigue, then doing some fasting can support autophagy and have great benefits

Starting point is 00:31:20 as well. Now, one of my single favorite supplements for supporting microplastic detox are targeted probiotics. And there are strains like AB22. This is a soil-based organism. If you ever see SBO's soil-based probiotics, bacillus and bacillus coagulins, these are great for getting rid of microplastics. They're my favorites. Also, though, lactobacillus plantarum. this is what's found in sauerkraut, tremendous benefits as well. Lactobacillus parcacii, that's also great. But getting a soil-based probiotic and eating sourcrow, but getting more probiotics in your diet, absolutely will help rid your body of microplastics. Now, there is a very advanced therapy that's not yet legal in the United States,

Starting point is 00:32:09 but it should be sometime next year. In fact, this is something that we're going to offer, and I have a clinic in Nashville, of the Longevity Clinic. And in that clinic, we will be the first to offer this therapy, we think, in January of next year. But right now, you can't do this advanced therapy in the United States. You can go to Europe for it. But it's called innesphoresis or therapeutic aphoresis and it's blood filtration that physically removes plastic from circulation in your body.

Starting point is 00:32:38 In a 2025 pilot study on 21 patients, some with ME and some with chronic fatigue syndrome, They did a double, they used a double filtration plasmapheresis, up to 70% of patients reported measurable symptom improvement. And this is the first direct clinical evidence that plastic can mechanically be removed from the human blood with these advanced types of therapies. And so in January of 2027, I believe that this will be available as well in the United States in really advanced cellular and functional medicine clinics like the longevity clinic. Now, I want to walk you through the foods that are going to have the greatest detoxification

Starting point is 00:33:20 benefits. By the way, if you go into the show notes, you can download our guide, our PDF on how to detox microplastics. And you'll get the exact supplements, the whole food list, everything, the exact protocol on how to detox microplastics. Just go to the show notes and you can download the PDF there. So let's dive into the top 10 foods to detox microplastics. Number one here is broccoli sprouts. Broccoli sprouts upregulate phase two liver detoxification. And according to John Hopkins University, it increases liver detoxification by 200%.

Starting point is 00:33:58 Next up here, number two are cilantro and Chlorella. Now, these are a really great pair because cilantro helps detoxify and Chlorella binds to toxins. So these are even more powerful together. Number three, wild caught small fish like anchovies, sardines, mackerel, and salmon could be on this list as well. Omega-3s reduce inflammation and overall also support detoxification. Number four is bone broth. Now, here's why bone broth is so powerful. Bone broth contains a compound called glycine.

Starting point is 00:34:31 And glycine is one of the necessary building blocks for your body to make glutathione. Now, glutathion is your body's master antioxidant. what supports detoxification, especially of the liver, gallbladder, and lymphatic system. And so getting more glutathione is great. Glycine helps support that and overall supports liver detoxification. Now, most of the time when people think of bone broth, they don't think of liver detoxification, but it helps with that. It also has proline, which helps rebuild and heal from the damage that microplastics can do to your body. Number five are bitter greens. Remember, bitter is better. They stimulate bile flow. And bioflow is what helps bind to and causes your

Starting point is 00:35:17 body to detoxify, especially via your gallbladder, your liver. But really, it's what amplifies your body's detoxification process. Bitter supports bile release. And that's also going to help bind to the toxins and get them out of your body. Number six, wild blueberries. Now, here's why blueberries, especially wild, are so powerful. When you buy those smaller blueberries that are sweet, but also they've got a strong sour flavor, that sour flavor comes from a compound called anthocyanins, which is very similar to the same compound that you're going to taste in things like cranberries. So when you taste a berry that's a little bit sour, that sourness is coming from anthocyanins. That's been shown in studies to support liver detoxification there. And then in addition to the wild

Starting point is 00:36:03 blueberries, we have pomegranate. Okay. Now, pomegranates, one of the things that happens with microplastic consumption is it damages your mitochondria. Your mitochondria are your power plants. They're the batteries of your body. When those are damaged, you get tired, fatigue. Not only do you feel physically tired, your organs get tired. They can't work as well. And so when you consume pomegranate, they're high in allergic acid, that can be converted into something called urelethin A, and that is a compound that helps you recycle and rebuild and heal. your mitochondria. So doing a several tablespoons a day of pomegranates, really powerful. So think about, hey, what's a great breakfast for you, sitting down and have these wild blueberries,

Starting point is 00:36:45 pomegranates a great way to go. Number eight here, a really great combination of garlic and onions. Now, garlic and onions contain sulfurane. These are compounds that detoxify microplastics. They also have antimicrobial properties. So they can help kill off viruses, bad bacteria. They have anti-candita properties. Here's something else that makes them unique. They have a unique type of fiber. They're a prebiotic fiber that helps good bacteria grow. So lots of benefits there with garlic and onions. And then avocado, they contain, avocados contain compounds that are precursors to building glutathion again. And they're also really high in fiber. They're also high in magnesium and potassium to minerals required for cellular detoxification. And number 10 here, one of my all-time favorites.

Starting point is 00:37:30 In fact, I had this for breakfast this morning, Macha green tea. Macha contains a compound called EGCG that stands for epigalactic catacin. These catechins have very similar to antioxidant properties to the wild blueberries, which also support healing your blood-brain barrier as well as your mitochondria and your cells.

Starting point is 00:37:51 And so again, Mata Green Tea for breakfast, really great for filtering out any toxins out of the body. So that's the top 10. And so maybe think about your plate like this. You know, starting off your morning with, you know, doing some, you know, a bone broth protein powder. So you're doing some protein that's collagen-based or bone broth-based. That's going to get you your glycine. And then for breakfast as well, start doing some wild blueberries and pomegranates.

Starting point is 00:38:18 That's a great meal. Maybe for lunch you have a grass-fed burger and you do sauteed garlic and onions there. Maybe you do an avocado on that burger as well. And then for dinner, wild-caught salmon. as part of a salad with some broccoli sprouts there, some micro, you know, some bitter greens, and have some macha green tea there, you know, and for breakfast as well. But if you follow it a meal plan like this, it is a perfect plate for detoxifying microplastics.

Starting point is 00:38:46 Now I want to dive into the top five supplements for detoxifying microplastics. Now, listen, there's a lot that you can take. A lot of things are beneficial. But the most beneficial here are number one, targeted probiotics, soil-based organisms, Lactobacillus plantarium, which is fun in sauerkraut, other species of lactobacillus that you're going to find in things like yogurt, greatly beneficial. So you can get this as a food, but also take it as a supplement. I personally, with my patients and myself, take a very high dose of soil-based organisms. You could take up to one trillion probiotics or at least 100 billion probiotics for the ultimate benefits of detoxification. But very ultra-high-dose probiotics are the best for. detoxification. Number two, sulfurane. This is broccoli sprout extracts. We talked about the sprouts earlier. Eat those. Those are great. You can also take a more concentrated supplement form. Number three, high capacity antioxidants. These protect your cells from the damage that

Starting point is 00:39:48 microplastics do. Number four, natural binders like clorella, modified citrus pectin, and other forms of fiber are great detoxifiers. And then number five, this is probably my favorite, I would say number one and number five are the two must-haves. Number five is NAC, NAC, that stands for N-acetyl-sysotin. N-asetal-sistine is a precursor to glutathione. So it's the number one supplement that's going to help drive and build up your glutathione levels. And again, glutathione is your body's master antioxidant that supports and really runs detoxification of your liver, your gallbladder also impacts the levitic system. So for your body to actually be strong enough to get rid of the microplastics and acetyl cysteine,

Starting point is 00:40:35 the most important in the list. So really think about it like this and acetyl cysteine. This is going to support liver detoxification, the probiotics and the fiber, those are going to support your detoxification of your digestive system and your intestines and colon to get microplastics out of your body. So if you can follow this plan of consuming those top 10 foods and these top five supplements as part of your microplastics, Detox Protocol, it's going to go a long way to helping rid your body of the toxic effects of microplastics. And so here's your assignment. For the next 30 days, swap one plastic exposure at a time.

Starting point is 00:41:13 Week one, change your water, right? Get a water filter. Number two, change some of your food storage. Number three, start changing some of your clothing. And number four, get rid of the toxic personal care products. Start using things that are essential oil-based, using natural ingredients like coconut oil. those are so much better and they're toxin-free. And here's something I truly believe.

Starting point is 00:41:33 I believe that you are going to start noticing a difference in 30 days. And I want you to mark, how do you feel now on a scale of 1 to 10? Make these changes and then let me know how you feel 30 days from now. And by the way, tag me online. I'd love to hear from you on Instagram or YouTube anywhere on social media on Facebook. And tag me and let me know. You know what, Dr. X, I did your detox.

Starting point is 00:41:53 I noticed this improvement. I feel better. So make sure to tag me because I would love to hear from you to hear the changes you're seeing in your body is you do this microplastic detox. And remember, if you want the full protocol, you can download the microplastic detox PDF there as well. Also, I want to encourage you, if you want to have a full program on how to fully detoxify, not just microplastics, but everything out of your body, you can pick up my new book. It's going to release here in just a few months. It's called Heal Yourselves. And I co-wrote this book with Dr. Will Cole. And you can

Starting point is 00:42:29 find a link to that in the show notes as well. Again, the book is called, heal yourselves. It really goes through how to heal anything, reverse the irreversible. You can go to Amazon.com as well and just search heal yourselves, Dr. Axe. It's the best book I've ever written. And it really walks you through how to promote longevity, reverse and heal anything you can imagine. I want to say, thanks so much for watching the Dr. Josh Axe show. Thanks for listening here to the Dr. Josh Jack show. And I just want to say also thank you for subscribing here to the podcast. You know, I feel like many of you are family and we're on a mission together. And I know, listen, I know I'm not the only one educating. I know a lot of you are sharing this information.

Starting point is 00:43:10 You're learning. You're growing by watching and subscribing. So I want to say, thanks for subscribing. If you're not subscribed, by the way, make sure to do that. That way, you don't miss a single thing. I've got some great guests coming up. I'm going to be doing a lot of more deep dives into detoxification and healing and cellular medicine. So don't Don't forget to subscribe and also thank you for sharing this and being on mission with me. I can't wait to see you on the next episode of The Doctor Ack Show.

The Dr. Josh Axe Show - Reverse Microplastic Toxicity NATURALLY (Heals Mitochondria, Gut, Brain) | Dr. Josh Axe

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