Clean blood is trendy, if you can afford it

Everybody’s into microplastics these days — or at least they’re really into us, having been found in food, water, and even newborns.

We don’t know exactly what microplastics do to our bodies, but it’s probably something, and that can be scary.

Meet Clarify Clinics

A London startup is hoping to assuage microplastic fears by offering to clean your blood, and all it costs is two hours… plus nearly $13k. Per Wired: 

• Patients are hooked up to a machine that filters microplastics from the plasma in your blood before cycling blood back into your body. It’s like a Brita filter for Dracula! 
• Some patients believe it helps with conditions like chronic fatigue or long covid.
• CEO Yael Cohen says she gets better sleep post-treatment (and her Oura ring apparently proves it).

Cleaning blood can be necessary when someone is exposed to a lot of harmful pollution, but (beyond the ever-helpful placebo effect) nobody knows if there’s an actual benefit to doing it electively.

• It’s like the Kim Kardashian-endorsed full-body scans that potentially do nothing.
• Similarly, hospitals saw an increase in elective surgeries post-covid, either because of pent-up demand or because they’re desperate for some kind of fix.
• They’re basically selling peace of mind, which isn’t worthless — but is it worth $13k? 

“A badge of honor”

That’s what Cohen says Clarify’s blood treatment is, and that’s the key here. 

Even if cleaning your blood has no immediate, practical benefit, wouldn’t you rather have clean blood than plastic-filled blood that might cause some unspecified health issue in the future?

And wouldn’t you be jealous if someone told you their blood was cleaner than your blood?