Are the growing levels of neurotoxic and neuro-disruptive chemicals in our food and drink contributing to the youth mental health crisis? A narrative review

Over the past few decades, there has been a marked and largely unexplained decline in the mental health and wellbeing of young people worldwide. While demographic and life context factors such as employment, education, economic status, life adversity, socialization habits, and physical activity predict mental wellbeing outcomes in older adults with high accuracy, their predictive power diminishes significantly in younger generations. This suggests that additional, underexplored factors are contributing to this decline. One such factor, often overlooked, is the increasing exposure of children and adolescents to neurotoxic and neuro-disruptive chemicals in the food and beverages they consume. These include agricultural and industrial chemicals (e.g., pesticide residues, heavy metals), additives in ultra-processed foods, and packaging-derived contaminants such as microplastics and bisphenols. Here, we provide a narrative review of the associations between exposure to these chemicals and adverse neurodevelopmental and mental health outcomes in youth, considering changes in farming practices, food production, and packaging over recent decades. We also highlight some of the key research challenges of evaluating these impacts and note the lack of attention from the neuroscience and neuroimaging communities. Altogether, the widespread presence of these neurotoxic and neuro-disruptive chemicals in the body and brain, and growing reports of their adverse impacts on behavior, cognition, and mental health in young people, points to the potential for progressive degradation of brain function that poses a grave threat to the future wellbeing of society and underscores the urgent need for increased research, funding, and regulation in this area.