The Hill reports:

Global expansion of plastic production, especially with single-use plastics, has created a crisis for human health and the environment. President Biden has failed to confront the problem. He has focused on false environmental solutions that waste billions of taxpayer dollars, as plastic pollution rapidly gets worse.

Plastic waste is so ubiquitous that it has entered the food we eat, the water we drink, the air we breathe, and even our blood. Some of the toxic chemicals used in everyday items such as plastic packaging can cause cancer and birth defects.

Our oceans, lakes, and rivers are now burdened with more than 200 million tons of plastic pollution. According to current estimates, some 11 million tons of plastic waste enter the world’s oceans every year.

As a result, the oceans are now filled with 170 trillion pieces of plastic. That’s 21,000 tiny microplastic pieces for every person on Earth. Worse, that amount is doubling approximately every six years.

We can turn it around though. There are sensible ways to manage plastic production, replace single-use plastic items with more sustainable alternatives, and overhaul our waste and recycling infrastructure. Single-use plastics are typically used for only a few minutes but leave us with waste that lasts hundreds of years.

I have a ten-point plan to fix the problem.

Read the full op-ed by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. here.