A new Netflix documentary claiming to link plastic exposure to infertility ran into a major problem on the very day of its release: the researcher featured in the film admits the experiment is not a scientific process.
A New York Times review – largely sympathetic to the film – couldn’t hide its many problems. The story’s sub-headline put it plainly:
“A new Netflix documentary explores whether cutting out plastic can improve our health. But it’s hardly a perfect experiment.”
The review quickly acknowledges that the film’s central premise lacks supporting scientific evidence, and it contains damning admission from Dr. Shanna Swan, the researcher featured in the film, that undermines this so-called experiment the film is trying to promote.
“The premise of the documentary is appealing: Cut plastic chemicals out of your life, and improve your fertility. But it’s not that straightforward.
“‘It’s not a quote unquote ‘scientific study,’ Dr. Swan acknowledged in the film. ‘We have no control group, it’s very small,’ she said.
“And it’s not clear that reducing daily exposure to such chemicals the way these participants did can increase an individual adult’s fertility.” (emphasis added)
The documentary’s conflicts of interest are equally notable. It brings together two prominent figures in plastic lawfare: Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest and California Attorney General Rob Bonta. Forrest’s philanthropic network financed the film while simultaneously funding a parallel plastics lawsuit filed alongside a case brought by Bonta – who is prominently featured in the documentary – making it difficult to separate the documentary’s fertility narrative from the broader litigation campaign.
More Entertainment Than Science
The documentary follows a handful of couples attempting to remove plastic-related chemicals from their daily lives in hopes of improving fertility, suggesting that reduced chemical exposure could lead to measurable reproductive benefits.
But even the limited outcomes featured in the documentary fail to establish any causal relationship. As the New York Times explains:
“Three of the five couples in the film did have babies. But it’s nearly impossible to ascribe cause and effect because of the small sample and the fact that the intervention wasn’t a controlled experiment.”
In other words, the central “experiment” lacks the basic requirements for scientific credibility: no control group, a tiny sample size, and no ability to establish cause and effect. The film itself acknowledges these limitations, which makes the sweeping claims surrounding it all the more problematic.
The Times isn’t alone in its skepticism. NBC’s TODAY Show blog featured an epidemiologist who was equally direct, urging “caution when interpreting the results”:
“You cannot draw any kind of causal conclusion from this study, and even a (similar) larger study. … For example, it’s possible other factors led to the improvement, or being involved in the study pushed the couples to live healthier lifestyles overall.”
Coverage elsewhere has similarly undercut the narrative surrounding the documentary. Recent reporting in The Guardian questioned many of the studies purporting to show high concentrations of plastics in human tissue (including reproductive organs), reflecting a recurring pattern:
“The Guardian has identified seven studies that have been challenged by researchers publishing criticism in the respective journals, while a recent analysis listed 18 studies that it said had not considered that some human tissue can produce measurements easily confused with the signal given by common plastics. There is an increasing international focus on the need to control plastic pollution but faulty evidence on the level of microplastics in humans could lead to misguided regulations and policies, which is dangerous, researchers say.”
Activists Promote Claims the Film Itself Won’t Make
Despite the documentary’s own admission that its central experiment is not scientific, activist organizations are already treating it as proof.
Describing the film, the Rockefeller-backed organization Beyond Plastics claims that lowering plastics exposure led to positive fertility outcomes.
“They dove into the intervention documented in The Plastic Detox with rigor and good humor—ditching fragranced cleaning items and personal care products, prioritizing plastic free food storage, and even swapping out their beloved sparkling water drinks. Their chemical loads fell within two months, and they began to notice striking changes: weight loss, more energy, less brain fog, better sleep, and dramatically higher fertility scores. A few months after the intervention, Julie became pregnant. Having learned how endocrine disruptors affect a developing child, she adapted the intervention changes down to the items she placed on her baby registry.” (emphasis added)
These claims go far beyond what the documentary itself, or the New York Times reporting on it, says can actually be proven.
Andrew Forrest’s Minderoo Network: Financing Both the Film and the Lawsuit
The documentary’s financial backing raises serious questions about undisclosed conflicts of interest.
The film is financed by Minderoo Films, part of the philanthropic network controlled by Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest. The documentary also prominently features AG Bonta and his plastics lawsuit targeting Exxon Mobil – while omitting crucial context about the lawsuit’s own funding.
When Bonta announced his case, several environmental NGOs filed a parallel plastics lawsuit, and both plaintiffs debuted their cases together at a joint press conference in September 2024. According to Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) filings submitted after the cases were filed, the NGO litigation is being financed by the Intergenerational Environment Justice Fund (IEJF) – an entity controlled by Forrest’s Minderoo Foundation.
In other words, the same philanthropic network that financed the documentary featuring AG Bonta is also funding the parallel NGO lawsuit.
There’s more. The law firm representing the NGOs resisted registering under FARA before being compelled to do so by the Department of Justice, suggesting that IEJF sought to shield their role in financing the case from public view.
California campaign finance records add another layer. That law firm donated nearly $40,000 to Bonta’s political campaign just months before the lawsuits were filed – contributions made at the same time the firm was receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from IEJF to support the NGO litigation. Notably, those political contributions were omitted from the firm’s FARA filing, despite the apparent legal requirement to disclose them.
The litigation has spawned separate legal disputes. A defamation countersuit against Bonta – examining whether his public statements about the company crossed a legal line – recently survived a federal court challenge, with a judge allowing key portions to proceed.
None of this context appears in the documentary, even as the film presents Bonta and his lawsuit favorably as part of its plastics narrative.
Bottom Line: The Netflix documentary may make for compelling theater. But by its own admission, the experiment at its center is not science. When even sympathetic media coverage is forced to highlight those limitations, it raises a simple question: if the evidence were truly strong, would activists need to rely on entertainment to make their case?
