The pandemic brought with it not only a major health crisis, but a new classification of litter for the world’s shorelines: pandemic pollution.
Most of this litter is made up of disposable masks, but it also includes disposable gloves, sanitizing wipes and single-use items associated with takeout food waste, and is now ubiquitous.
The Oceanic Conservancy, a national nonprofit, published a recent report with new data on pandemic pollution, or what it calls “the rising tide of plastic, personal protective equipment” along beaches and waterways across the U.S. and globe.
Cleanup volunteers, using the nonprofit’s Clean Swell app, in the latter half of 2020 documented the removal of more than 107,000 items of PPE from beaches and waterways worldwide.
And that’s likely an undercount, according to the study, because the PPE category was added to the app in July 2020. If previous PPE items were picked up, they were likely categorized under “personal hygiene”or “other trash,” which also jumped significantly.
“The pandemic, in a nutshell, has laid bare our over-reliance on single-use plastics and how our management systems are struggling to keep up with it all,” said Nicholas Mallos, senior director of the Ocean Conservancy’s Trash Free Seas program. “The PPE pollution is huge, and this is on top of the existing global crisis we know as plastic pollution.”
It’s a growing trend in Hawaii, as well, according to local nonprofits and volunteers that clean isle shorelines and parks.
At a recent cleanup of the Halona Beach Cove and lookout, volunteers from the nonprofit 808 Cleanups picked up dozens of face masks — both disposable and reusable — strewn along the rocks, along with plastic food wrap and other litter.
“There’s quite a bit out there,” said 808 Cleanups founder Michael Loftin. “There’s been particular cleanups, especially areas prone to windblown trash already, including lookouts on Oahu and Halona Blowhole, where there is a big percentage of masks.”
The masks tend to cluster along windblown, coastal areas, according to Loftin, but are sometimes found in neighborhoods and parks as well.
“Unfortunately, with those ear loops, I’m really worried about entanglement if it gets out into the ocean,” he said.
According to the Ocean Conservancy, much of the disposable PPE is made of the same kinds of plastic polymers as other familiar products, such as bags and bottles.
When lost in the ocean, the PPE, similar to other plastics, will travel along currents, washing up on shorelines, and break down into microplastics, according to the conservancy. The ear loops on face masks also pose an entanglement threat to ocean wildlife, and some conservation groups have cited animal deaths from ingesting PPE items.
As a nonprofit, 808 Cleanups encourages volunteers to adopt a site or organize their own cleanups, whether solo or as a small group, with photos and the weight documented via an app and shared on social media. Over the year, face masks cropped up in the stream of photos shared on Facebook.
808 Cleanups volunteer Kelly Quin, an avid swimmer, cleans up shoreline and underwater litter as she swims in Waikiki and West Oahu.
She has retrieved fabric face masks from the Waikiki reef, and usually finds a mask or two in the sand anywhere between Kaimana Beach and the Hilton. She also sees them along the path around Diamond Head.
“It’s been pretty much constant,” she said.
Mostly, she finds fishing lines and hooks, but sometimes plastic utensils and cups, straws, hair ties, sunglasses, golf balls, socks, beach towels, an anchor and other miscellaneous items, about a mile offshore.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Quin said she found a lot of disposable gloves as well but that those have dwindled, and there are now mostly masks, both disposable and fabric, along coastlines.
She is worried that fabric face masks or towels in the ocean could end up smothering coral reefs.
Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii Director Rafael Bergstrom said he and his volunteers are seeing more masks and other PPE, as well the more common litter, which has not gone away, either.
At a recent community cleanup in Kaimuki and Palolo Stream, volunteers found a fair amount of masks and gloves.
“It was a lot more than we would have found before,” he said. “Just walking anywhere — I walk up and down Waialae (Avenue), and every day there’s masks always on the ground.”
Most of them are disposable, surgical-style masks, he said, likely because they are light and blow away like Styrofoam containers. But many fabric masks seem to fall out of parked cars along the street, as well.
The pandemic also has boosted the volume of single-use, throwaway products in the name of safety, he said. The most common items picked up in Kaimuki included takeout containers, plastic bottles and caps.
“The whole push for disposables was really done in a way that was sad,” he said. “It was capitalizing on people’s fear during the pandemic.”
But viruses live on plastic as long as other types of items, he said, and people can also remain safe by bringing their own bags or utensils.
On April 1, Honolulu’s ordinance aimed at reducing plastic pollution went into effect, prohibiting food vendors from providing disposable serviceware made of petroleum-derived plastic. In addition, disposable plastic-free serviceware, such as paper straws and compostable utensils, is to be provided only upon request.
The ordinance was postponed three months to give restaurants more time to prepare due to hardships brought by the pandemic.
Disposable straws and food containers consistently have been among the top 10 items found during beach cleanups, according to Mallos of Ocean Conservancy, and the volume found is expected to increase at this year’s International Coastal Cleanup in September. The new category of PPE waste might make it to the top 10 list, as well.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention still recommends wearing face masks in public as a precaution after getting the COVID-19 vaccine. State and county mask mandates also remain in place.
“PPE is not going away,” said Mallos. “Masks are likely to be part of our everyday lives.”
What’s important is for the public to minimize the likelihood of releasing masks into the environment. The nonprofit recommends keeping a trash bag in your car to stow used PPE; cutting ear loops on masks before disposal to prevent entanglements; and to reduce, rather than increase, the consumption of single-use items.
“It’s hard to overlook that bright blue face mask,” he said. “In some ways PPE is shedding a new spotlight on the broader system issue that is global plastic pollution. Potentially, one outcome is greater public awareness.”
THE NEW CLASSIFICATION OF LITTER
Results of an ocean study conducted by Ocean Conservancy:
Did you see PPE at an International Coastal Cleanup in 2020?
>> 94% said yes
>> 5% said no
>> 1% said don’t know
What was the most common type of PPE you encountered?
>> 81%, face masks
>> 10%, gloves
>> 6%, sanitizing wipes
>> 2%, other
>> 0.5%, other face shields
Recommendations
>> Dispose of PPE responsibly at home.
>> Keep a trash bag in your car for used PPE.
>> Cut ear loops of masks before disposal.
Source: Ocean Conservancy
