During the pandemic, an estimated 129 billion masks are used every month around the world, and they are now added to other trash on the streets. Image source: Asia Atuah | Copywriting Team Leader

Crushed plastic bottles, scattered wrapping paper and crumpled Grubhub receipts around the campus are accompanied by a new environmental disaster waiting to happen: scattered masks. 

According to a 2020 report by the advocacy organization OceansAsia, an estimated 52 billion disposable masks were produced last year. According to an article in the scientific journal Environmental Science and Technology, during the pandemic, an estimated 129 billion masks are used every month worldwide. 

Since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that in areas where COVID-19 is spreading or highly spreading (including Franklin County), regardless of the vaccination status, masks should be generally worn indoors, so it is expected that masks will continue to be widely used. 

Kent Halloran, a rainwater engineer in the Ohio State University's Environmental Health and Safety Department, said in an email that mask waste has exacerbated the general waste problem on campus and the environment. 

Halloran said that mask waste appeared throughout the campus, including building entrances, parking lots and bus stops. He said that although he has just arrived at the scene, compared with other discarded materials, the garbage related to masks has increased more. 

Halloran said that this increase may be due to the sudden introduction of masks in campuses due to the pandemic. People generally did not realize the importance of recycling and reducing mask waste — just like other forms of garbage — and the natural tendency to remove masks. Wear a mask from time to time, such as outdoors, but not handled properly.

Halloran said: "Although masks were used in medical settings before the pandemic, they are not as common in public settings as they are now." 

Ryan Clevenger is a fourth-year student of the Sustainable Plant System and the co-chair of the Campus Cleaning Club, which is dedicated to cleaning up trash on and off campus. He said that masks are one of the club’s most common types of trash since the pandemic began.

Klevinger said: "Masks are often littered. We even play a small game to calculate how many masks we pick up in each meeting." "It's like a game to see who can get the most."

Dr. Joseph Gastaldo, Medical Director of OhioHealth's Infectious Disease System, said that the survival rate of the virus on the mask depends on the time the mask is placed, the wearer's viral load, and environmental factors, such as ultraviolet rays from the sun, which destroy the virus. 

Gastado said that there is no need to worry about the spread of COVID-19 to surrounding areas through scattered masks, because the virus will not spread in this way.

Gastado said: "It has never been proven that throwing masks away as discarded trash will cause any spread of COVID-19." "But in the trash picking scene, if you have to pick up a lot of trash, you don't know, you are on the ground. When you see a mask, you don’t know how long it’s been there. You don’t know who wore it. You really don’t know the underlying conditions of that mask there. Therefore, in this regard, treat the mask as what I said The disclosed potential biological hazards are safe."

Gastado said that picking up littered masks is like picking up any other trash and is generally considered safe. The safest way is to wear gloves and disinfect or wash your hands before touching any other items.

Halloran said that the hazards of improper disposal of masks are similar to general trash and rubbish, including negative impacts on natural habitats and chemical and biological impacts. 

“Masks are made of non-woven fabrics made of polypropylene and other plastics, which help filter and protect us,” Halloran said. "But in the environment, we expect these materials to degrade and cause the same problems as other plastic waste." 

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, plastic waste can negatively affect and degrade habitats and damage ecosystems. Contaminants can also accumulate on the surface of the plastic, which may harm organisms that interact with the garbage. The ingestion of plastic by mammals also affects their body functions to a large extent.

Halloran said that the university has carried out various activities to communicate the correct way to safely dispose of masks through electronic communications, bus advertisements and newsletters. He said that the best practice for campus communities is to discard general-purpose masks in the trash can, not in the environment. 

"During the pandemic, mask trash has definitely become a ubiquitous problem, but this is definitely a problem that our horse chestnut can solve by just throwing masks in the trash can," Halloran said.

Klevinger said that having more places to properly dispose of masks will also help solve the problem of mask garbage, because the city lacks many public trash cans for students to throw away used masks.

"I find that mask trash is really frustrating. I fully support wearing masks to ensure the safety of our community, but I feel that the current waste management infrastructure around the campus has failed to address this new source of trash," Klevinger Say. "This is a problem that can be solved, like littering."

The Lantern is the award-winning independent student voice of Ohio State University, covering sports, campus, politics, art and life.

View Lantern's archive here.

You can contact the Lantern newsroom by email (lantern@osu.edu) or phone (614-292-5721).

Interested in The Lantern's advertising? Visit our advertising page for more information!

Lantern will accept opinions and stories on any topic. If you want to submit a story, click here.

Copyright 2021 Lantern Media Group