In 2017, a study by Jennifer Lavers and Dr Alex Bond, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that due to ocean currents and the way debris moves within the South Pacific Gyre, plastic was accumulating on Henderson Island more densely than anywhere else in the world. They estimated that its beaches were covered in 38 million pieces of plastic debris. Designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the 1980s due to its near-pristine state, the uninhabited Henderson Island was now the most plastic-polluted island in the world.