The dramatically increased demand for face masks exacerbated marine plastic contamination
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the demand for face masks has increased to 100 times than the pro-covid era and is projected to increase by 20% annually. Globally, people have an estimated monthly use of 129 billion face masks and 65 billion gloves. Face masks are plastic-based and plastics constituent 20-25% by mass, with the thermoplastic polypropylene being the major component. They are often mixed with other household waste and plastic bags and end up in landfills or leaking to the ocean.
OceanAsia, a non-profit whose mission is to investigate and research marine conversion, estimated that 1.56 billion face masks entered our ocean in 2020, and the Mediterranean is at risk of seeing more face masks than jellyfish. In OceanAsia’s visit to a remote beach of Hongkong, the team found 70 face masks along a 100-meter shoreline in February 2020, when the mask-wearing policy was implemented for 6 weeks, and later in November they collected 54 masks in an hour. Similar stories are documented in 100 countries. But why?
How face masks enter our ocean
Improper disposal or handling of contaminated waste poses a threat to public health as 30% of mismanaged plastic becomes marine plastic pollution. The public’s improper disposal of used face masks and gloves adds burdens during the pandemic. Improper disposal and subsequent dispersion of just 1% of face masks would result in more than 10 million masks per month, weighing 30,000 to 40,000 kg. Once the face masks are discarded in public areas, they are lightweight and easily carried from land, landfills, and boats by winds and currents, in the end littering the beach and seabed. The pandemic impacted the waste management services, and many services failed to fully operate under the restrictions of social distance and stay-at-home orders. For example, the US suspended curbside pickup in some places, and the UK observed a trifold increase in illegal dumping during the pandemic.
Face masks and rollback the bans on single-use plastic bags add burdens to marine plastic contamination
The public concerns over the virus’s survival on contaminated plastic waste increase the demand for single-use plastics (e.g., from online shopping, food delivery, takeout packaging) and at the meantime, rescinds the laws to ban single-use plastics in many jurisdictions. For example, UK's ban on plastic straws, stirrers and cotton, originally planned to start in April, has been delayed for half a year. Some state governments (e.g., Massachusetts, San Francisco, Maine and New York) in the US also suspended the plastic bag bans with the fear of "unsanitary" of reusable bags from the public. However, single-use plastics, especially PPE (personal protective equipment) like face masks, which are overwhelming waste management systems, have more side-effects than usual amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Mismanagement of face masks contributes to marine plastic contamination and dramatically impacts ecosystems and marine organisms via plastics ingestion and entanglement, and the contamination likely goes up to the food chain (see our previous post). In addition, unlike the general marine plastic, the used face masks are a waste vector that carries and allows the SARS-CoV-2 virus to survive up to 7 days. People exposed to the infectious wastes are likely to get infected. For example, the first local confirmed case from Chengdu, China on December 7 was found to have picked up infectious wastes. Subsequent sampling of the confirmed case's home showed that door handles, switches, some food in the refrigerator, and cutting boards were all tested positive.
Reducing and reusing face masks, coupled with proper end-of-life handling, are important but a bottleneck dilemma in each practice
Reduce: Recommended from the World Health Organization, rational use of PPE, stay-at-home quarantine orders, social distancing, and reduction of events and gatherings helps reduce the need. However, as mentioned above, it is currently a dilemma since the demand for online orders and takeout packaging or food delivery services dramatically increases the use and disposal of other single-use plastic.
Reuse: For routine and surgical uses, the production and implementation of reusable elastomeric respirators could meet the supply for healthcare preparedness during surges. The use of reusable elastomeric respirators requires strict protocols for cleaning, disinfection, and storage, limiting the universality of public uses. Instead, washable cotton masks are more commonly recommended by the policies. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States and the Federal Government of Canada requested that the public avoid using medical-grade PPE and recommended using washable or hand-made cloth masks. However, there is a debate on the potential increasing microplastic problem due to reusable masks. Laundering fabric masks releases microfibers into the aquatic environment after wastewater is treated. Polyester microfibers persist for a long time in the natural water bodies and make their way up in the food webs, and biodegradability of cotton and rayon microfibers is unknown.
End-of-life: Fold, tie, and wrap when you remove and dispose of the single-use surgical mask or N95 respirator.
When bin for hazardous waste is available, spot it and trash the used PPE in the bin.
If you have to mix the used masks with general household waste, make sure the bag is sealed before it goes to the landfill trash bin.
Policy Implications
Hygiene concerns make a lot of reuse and recycling unfeasible, which brings back more single-plastic uses and waste and overwhelms the waste management services. Responsible consumption and disposal and waste collection must be reinforced (maybe incorporated with 3S technologies–GPS, GIS, and RS). Some countries introduce penalty fines for irresponsible littering of PPE. France increased fines for littering from €68 to €135, which can increase to as much as €375 for late payment, and higher in some circumstances.
Existing treatment facilities should find ways to maximize their capacity. For example, Wuhan, China, where the virus first emerged and broke out, had to build a medical waste plant and 46 mobile treatment facilities to handle six times as much medical waste as usual. The Environment Agency of the UK has relaxed rules to help the overwhelmed waste industry to cope with the pandemic and allowed burning infectious waste in municipal waste incinerators, which previously was not the case.
To add complexity, the waste management services in some countries rely on the informal sector where waste pickers are risky to get infected when they collect potentially contaminated waste. The improper disposal of medical waste leads to a higher prevalence of the virus among waste workers and the illegal resale of used face masks. In addition, many recyclers lost their jobs due to stringent social distancing and stay-at-home measures. Although some countries like Turkish government provide disinfected accommodations and food aid for local waste pickers, they call for a work chance or aid in cash to make ends meet. International Solid waste Association recommends that proper waste management within the COVID-19 pandemic should also find ways to ensure the functionality of waste service workers while keeping them safe, perhaps by incorporating safety measures into waste services including collection, disposal and treatment of medical waste.
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