Plastic toothbrushes are made with nylon bristles and of course a plastic handle. Both plastic and nylon are derived from petroleum and contain BPA, phthalates, PFAS and many other carcinogenic and hormone disrupting compounds. As you brush your teeth with these nylon bristles - microplastic fragments are broken off, absorbed, and swallowed.
Matter of fact, the average person ingests up to 88,000 microplastic particles every year from their plastic toothbrush alone.
Here is the proof: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38092338/
Even worse, a newer 2025 study has now confirmed that plastic toothbrushes actually release up to 2.3 million microplastic particles per year.
Proof: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0147651325010395
In result, you are unknowingly dosed with said toxic compounds daily. This is in addition to the fact that nylon bristles are much coarser than boar bristles and can cause enamel damage and a receding gum-line.
Not to mention, the massive environmental damage that plastic toothbrush production and waste impose. Every year, 1 billion plastic toothbrushes are disposed of in the US alone, leading to over 50 million pounds of plastic waste. Since plastic takes hundreds of years to decompose, this leads to irreversible damage to our ecosystems.