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In Geneva, negotiators from 175 nations are trying to hammer out the first-ever legally binding treaty on plastic pollution. The urgency of the talks was underscored this week by a new study published in The Lancet.

In the wake of the Trump administration’s decision to dismantle the research arm of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a robust if little-known California agency called the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment is poised to take on an even bigger role to bridge the gap.

Microplastics are really small pieces of plastic — less than five millimeters long on one side or about the size of a pencil eraser. That means some of them are visible to the naked eye, but others are so tiny that you can’t even see them — smaller than the width of your hair or even a red blood cell.

An unorthodox argument from anti-abortion advocates that abortion pills and the at-home abortion process pose a substantial environmental risk is gaining traction in state legislatures across the country.

In the oceans, the most widespread type of plastic pollution may be the kind you can’t see. A new study published Wednesday in the journal Nature estimates that the North Atlantic Ocean alone contains 27 million metric tons of nanoplastic — plastic particles 100 times smaller than the width of a human hair. That figure is 10 times higher than previous estimates of plastic pollution of all sizes across all the world’s oceans, according to the study’s authors.

A leading expert in the health impacts of plastic pollution and microplastics is calling on the UN to end the use of toxic chemicals in all plastics, cap and reduce plastic production and argues against a treaty focused on waste management and recycling, as part of an international Plastics Treaty.

No place on Earth is safe from plastic pollution. Plastic garbage and tiny shards of these long-lived petroleum-based polymers taint the highest Himalayan mountains, deepest ocean trenches, outermost Antarctic field stations and hidden recesses of the human body.

I used to love my Teflon pans. I crisped tofu, fried latkes, and reduced sauces to sticky glazes in them, marveling at how cleanup never took more than a swipe of a sponge. Then I started to worry that my skillets might kill me.