This January, Panama became the first Central American country to ban the use of plastic bags. This remarkable move aims to offset the negative impacts that single use plastic has on the environment and its inhabitants. Worldwide, plastic production has been increasing rapidly since 1950, largely in the form of products that are used once and then thrown away. Plastic does not biodegrade, and instead it breaks into smaller pieces that turn up in oceans and lakes. Birds and other species inadvertently consume plastic, mistaking it for food, and repeated ingestion of plastic can lead to death. Plastics themselves can leach biphenyl, an endocrine disrupting chemical, and there is evidence that microplastics are creeping into the human food chain.