Discarded Face Masks and PPEs End Up in Oceans

A study published in summer this year in the Environmental Science & Technology journal approximated that more than 120 billion masks and over 60 billion plastic-containing gloves are used worldwide every month, with a substantial portion ending up in the oceans of the world. Independent news site reported that "evidence has been literally piling up" in the Pacific Ocean.

Every year, the California Coastal Commission is holding a cleanup day, gathering thousands of volunteer participants from San Diego to Eureka.

This year's annual one-day event took place throughout the whole month of September, and upon its conclusion, the commission reported they were able to pull about 70,000 pounds of trash from creeks, parks, beaches, and other public areas.

The said news website also reported, roughly 70 percent of the debris contained plastic, the majority of it one-time use items such as face masks, beverage straws, water bottles, and containers from takeout food orders.

What surprised many people was that out of 50 categories of reported wastes, gloves, masks, and other personal, proactive equipment or PPEs ranked 12.

In a state in the United States where 80 percent of ocean trash coins on land, the said objects had never accounted for "enough of the debris" to necessitate their own classification, the same report indicated.

(Photo : Leon Neal/Getty Images)
A gull picks up a discarded protective face mask from the shoreline in the marina in Dover, England. Wildlife conservation groups have warned of the impact that single-use facemasks are already having on the environment, with discarded facemasks, rubber gloves, hand sanitizer bottles and other pieces of single-use PPE washing up on beaches globally.

Cities and Counties Moving More Aggressively

According to Eben Schwartz, who directs the marine debris program of the Coastal Commission, "The face mask should not be on the ground in the first place," adding, they should be worn over the face.

Schwartz also said, most synthetic materials have the "potential to leach chemicals into the environment," specifically plastics into the environment and consequently disrupt the food web.

California is a state that has attempted to talk about plastic pollution seriously, sometimes in danger of reportedly becoming "the butt of jokes in doing so."

The state currently has a regulation requiring restaurants to provide plastic straws only customers' request. However, in 2020, the law narrowly defeated a much stricter recommendation that would have called for the single-use plastic to be reduced by 76 percent over the next 10 years.

Reports said, this regulation is possible to return. In connection to such a legislature, cities and counties surrounding the Bay have moved even more aggressively.

Banning of Plastic Straws

San Francisco has prohibited the use of plastic straws, many of which end up in the water, as have Berkeley and Oakland, as well as the other side of the Bay.

Furthermore, environmental officials of San Francisco approximated that one million plastic straws each year ended up in the Bay before the guidelines took hold in 2019.

Meanwhile, in Berkeley, almost any item that usually accompanies takeout food items, from packs of ketchup to plastic utensils, is given to customers only upon their request.

Gloves and face masks, while not found spoiling the Bay in a similar quantity as some other plastic garbage, have dented much of the progress such regulations made.

However, this new junk is abundantly surrounding the Bay, as a recent tour from East Oakland's still-crowded streets through Marin County's wealthy coastal communities, as well as over the "Golden Bridge."

ALSO READ: What Are the Best COVID-19 Face Masks for Classrooms?

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