Scientists think they've identified the reason some cancer rates are

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You’ve probably heard the concerning reports about high rates of cancer — specifically colon cancer and other unlikely variants of the disease — among young people. These numbers have baffled oncologists for several years now.

But some scientists think they’ve finally figured out what’s driving this spike:

A major scientific review may have found a possible cause of many of the cancers for which genetics, diet and lifestyle cannot explain.

After reviewing more than 3,000 studies on microplastics, researchers concluded that these tiny toxins are linked to lung and colon cancer, as well as other lung diseases and infertility.

“Microplastics.”

Microplastics “are pieces of plastic smaller than 5mm in diameter that are released by consumer goods like food containers, clothes, toys, packaging, cigarette filters and tires,” according to the Mail.

You might think you’ve been able to avoid them, but apparently it’s a bit of a difficult proposition:

They’ve contaminated the air we breathe, food we eat and water we drink and have been found in virtually every major human organ, where they cause widespread inflammation when the immune system recognizes it as a foreign invader.

We’ve covered them before:

Basically, you’ve probably encountered a lot of microplastics unless you’ve been living in a cabin in the middle of the woods somewhere.

The plastics can “cause a myriad of medical problems, including tissue damage and inflammation in the liver and heart, and over time, accumulation in the body can lead to irreversible damage.”

And those effects might be responsible for a whole host of ongoing health problems:

The California researchers concluded exposure to microplastics is ‘suspected’ to play a role in colon cancer, ovarian function, sperm quality and respiratory diseases, including lung cancer.

In other words, the crisis could be more widespread than any of us realize.

What’s more,

[W]ith plastic production expected to triple by 2060, the UC researchers said: ‘Due to ubiquitous exposure and bioaccumulative characteristics of microplastics, the extent of human health impacts due to microplastic exposure is of great concern.’

The review, published earlier this month in ACS Publications Environmental Science & Technology, analyzed approximately 3,000 animal and human studies that researched an association between microplastic exposure and health outcomes in the respiratory, digestive and reproductive systems.

And the researchers are blunt in what they think should be done.

‘We urge regulatory agencies and policy leaders to consider the growing evidence of health harms from microplastics, including colon and lung cancer …

‘We hope state leaders will take immediate action to prevent further exposures.’