It did list a cellulose bags as one source, however I don't quite understand how. Additive to strengthen the material?

Get yourself a Guppy friend 🙂

Jokes on you, I don't wash my coats

When someone is getting laid and he drops a load in her, he’s probably injecting microplastics.

Just a thought for next time you are in bed with someone.

My tinfoil hat theory is that we're going to find out that toothbrushes are a major source of them

Just buy paper tea bags or loose leaf tea. The article is talking about those stupid nylon “pyramid” tea bags.

You can switch to loose leaf. I thought loose leaf sucked because the tea bits always got in it. Then I found a metal filter that has like, 180nm holes in it. Extremely fine mesh.

I use it more than paper tea bags now!

Get a tea infuser. Loose tea tends to be 100x better quality anyway.

From the article:

To come to this conclusion, the team tested tea bags made from nylon-6, polypropylene, and cellulose, all typical packaging for teas. They found that when brewing tea, "polypropylene releases approximately 1.2 billion particles per milliliter, with an average size of 136.7 nanometres; cellulose releases about 135 million particles per milliliter, with an average size of 244 nanometres; while nylon-6 releases 8.18 million particles per milliliter, with an average size of 138.4 nanometres."

Your tea bag...

No, it's not, because I use something other than tea bags.

That's you. That's what you wrote.

I wish stainless steel strainers weren't dogshit for rooibos :(

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics_and_human_health

The potential health impacts of microplastics vary based on factors, such as their particle sizes, shape, exposure time, chemical composition (enriched with heavy metals, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), etc.), surface properties, and associated contaminants.[76][77]

Experimental and observational studies in mammals have shown that microplastics and nanoplastics exposure have the following adverse effects:

On the cellular level

Inflammation[78][79]  
Oxidative stress[80][78][81][82][77]  
Genotoxicity[83][82]  
Cytotoxicity[81][77]  

By systems

Cardiovascular[84][62]  
Respiratory[59]  
    Inflammation in the lungs from inhalation[75]  
Disruption of hypothalamic-pituitary axis (HPA), including the Hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid, Hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal, Hypothalamic-pituitary-testicular and Hypothalamic-pituitary-ovarian axis[85]  
Reproductive toxicity,[85] decreased reproductive health, decreased sperm quality[85]  
Developmental abnormalities[85]  
Immunotoxicity[85][86][81][79]  
Endocrine disruption[85][87]  
Neurotoxicity[85]  
Metabolic disturbances[78]  
    Disrupted gut-liver axis resulting in increased risk of insulin resistance[88]  
    disrupted hormone function, potentially contributing to weight gain.[89][90]  

Epidemiological studies

Despite growing concern and evidence, most epidemiologic studies have focused on characterizing exposures. Epidemiological studies directly linking microplastics to adverse health effects in humans remain yet limited and research is ongoing to determine the full extent of potential harm caused by microplastics and their long-term impact on human health.[91][92]

There is plenty of reason to consider microplastics a major adverse health factor. The problem is that it is a relatively new field of research and making an epidemiological assessment is difficult as we are exposed to thousands of harmful substances, so knowing which effect comes from what is not a trivial thing to figure out.

We tried that approach with leaded gasoline and paint, asbestos building materials, cigarettes, and a variety of other things over the past several generations. They didn't kill the entire world population, but things didn't turn out so well for the people who waited for definitive studies. Good luck with your gamble.