Measuring What Reaches the Newborn: A New Framework for Quantification of Microplastic Exposure in Neonatal Feeding Pathway
Infants admitted to a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) are among a hospital’s most vulnerable patients. In many cases, feeding at the breast isn’t possible so they rely on expressed milk that has been stored and delivered through plastic containers and tubes. With the nutrition, infants may be receiving something else: microplastics. UVA researchers are generating the first U.S.-based quantitative dataset to measure microplastic exposure for tube-fed U.S. NICU newborns.
October 2026
