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Plastic is everywhere. From the food we eat to the air we breathe, tiny particles of plastic — also known as “microplastics” — can be found in almost anything. Not only does plastic cause real havoc on our oceans and take centuries to decay, causing even more of an environmental crisis, but toxicologists have questioned whether consuming microplastics can negatively impact health. Especially if there are pieces of plastic you’re using on a regular basis, like say your handy-dandy plastic cutting board.

Nanoplastics have been found in our blood. Now, researchers at Duke University have evidence that these tiny but ubiquitous bits of pollution may potentially be impacting our brains. The study is among some of the latest findings about how small particles — including air pollution and plastic — are linked to troubling health problems.

Giving gifts is a tradition in many countries around the world. Unfortunately, it has become linked to consumerism, resulting in a lot of unnecessary gifts that eventually wind up in the trash. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Plastic pollution is an enormous global problem, and a lot of focus has been rightly placed on the devastating effects that plastic is having on our oceans and marine life. But plastic pollution on land is a big problem, too, as experts have recently been reminded when they started discovering giant blobs of the stuff inside the stomachs of dead camels.

At this year’s Lisbon Web Summit, Euroviews spoke to No More Plastic founder and president Rosalie Mann about the reasons why we are oblivious to the dangers plastic poses to our health and our environment, as well as the ways in which we could change our approach to reduce the hazard we face almost unknowingly.

Interacting closely with human tourists does not always work out well for the animals. According to the park’s Facebook page, one of their wildebeest recently died, and the autopsy revealed that it had five plastic bags in its stomach.

A sick bear in Telluride, Colorado, was euthanized by authorities — and upon a necropsy, they discovered that the animal had suffered for months due to plastic waste blocking its digestive system.

It may seem daunting to change the way we celebrate a beloved holiday. It may also be necessary. Every parent of young children has awoken on Nov. 1 to the aftermath of Halloween: piles of candy wrappers, discarded costumes, molding pumpkins and decorations demanding to be taken down.

Bioplastics called PHAs grow like beer and biodegrade like wood. And they may be able to help with our plastic waste problem.

That symbol of “chasing arrows” you find on plastic does NOT mean it can be recycled. What we often call “recycling numbers” are actually “resin identification numbers” – meaning they tell you what kind of plastic you are dealing with. And this symbol was designed this way on purpose by the big plastic corporations, to give us the sense all plastic could be recycled. Which is of course not true.