Not only of science papers, I recently bought new shampoo and it has a "0% microplastics" label, on its plastic bottle.. it's milking people's emotions for money, like usual
The White House pdf suggests a scientific consensus of some form, stating: “Researchers are sounding alarm bells over the growing presence of microplastics in the human body, and are concerned that the ingestion of microplastics and exposure to plastic-related pollution are posing a growing risk to public health.”
You get nice news headlines with no tangible issues to health are found and it's easy to just prove a bunch of microplastics in all the things.
If I wanted an easy PhD I'd likely do the same due to how shitty academic hustle is in today's world...