The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a huge patch of garbage believed to stretch miles wide and the goal of this petion is to tell the government to stop dumping trash in the ocean and to remove most of what is already there.
Some of these long-lasting plastics end up in the stomachs of marine birds and animals, and their young,[5] including sea turtles and the Black-footed Albatross.[30] Besides the particles' danger to wildlife, on the microscopic level the floating debris can absorb organic pollutants from seawater, including PCBs, DDT, and PAHs.[31] Aside from toxic effects,[32] when ingested, some of these are mistaken by the endocrine system as estradiol, causing hormone disruption in the affected animal.[30] These toxin-containing plastic pieces are also eaten by jellyfish, which are then eaten by larger fish.
Many of these fish are then consumed by humans, resulting in their ingestion of toxic chemicals.[33] Marine plastics also facilitate the spread of invasive species that attach to floating plastic in one region and drift long distances to colonize other ecosystems.[14][dead link]
On the macroscopic level, the physical size of the plastic kills birds and turtles as the animals' digestion can not break down the plastic inside their stomachs. A second effect of the macroscopic plastic is to make it much more difficult for animals to see and detect their normal sources of food.[citation needed]
Research has shown that this plastic marine debris affects at least 267 species worldwide and a few of the 267 species reside in the North Pacific Gyre.[34]
