A new report outlines the under-recognised danger to human, and planetary, health from plastics.

The report in medical journal The Lancet links plastics to disease and death from infancy to old age and for health-related economic losses exceeding $1.5tr annually. Furthermore, the impact of these events have disproportionately high outcomes for low-income and at-risk populations.

The accelerating growth in plastic production, from 2Mt in 1950, to 475Mt in 2022 is cited as the main cause of this crisis, and it is worrying that production is projected to be 1,200Mt by 2060.

The result od plastic production is plastic waste, and plastic pollution has worsened with 8,000Mt of plastic waste now polluting the planet. Currently, less than 10 per cent of plastic is recycled.

To address plastics' harms globally, UN member states resolved in 2022 to develop a comprehensive, legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, the Global Plastics Treaty.

Coincident with the expected finalisation of this treaty, an independent, indicator-based global monitoring system: the Lancet Countdown on health and plastics is being launched. This Countdown will identify, track, and regularly report on a suite of geographically and temporally representative indicators that monitor progress toward reducing plastic exposures and mitigating plastics' harms to human and planetary health.

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