Disposable Masks: Why it is important to stop using them
The arrival of COVID-19 generated a waste management problem that we have to face: Disposable Masks.
About 2 years ago, at the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020, an event occurred that made a 365-degree turn in our lives: the pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2.
In conjunction with medicine, our main weapon of defense at that time was the face masks, the most commonly used being disposable masks or surgical masks.
Initially, disposable masks were chosen because of the high degree of danger that COVID-19 represented, in addition to the fact that they had the benefit of excellent protection and relatively low cost (although their price increased due to the high demand). All due to the fact that the raw material for their production is easily accessible, plastic.
Fortunately for us, the situation has now calmed down and COVID-19 is not the threat it was a few months ago. However, although the threat of the virus has diminished, the consequent effects of having discarded all the masks is still a latent risk to the environment.
It is estimated that during 2020 about 1560 million masks ended up polluting our oceans, which meant an increase of about 6240 cubic tons of plastic pollution in the oceans.
1,560,000,000 masks ended up in our oceans, representing an increase of 6,240,000 cubic kilograms of plastic.
Surgical masks or disposable masks: Why are they so harmful to the environment?
Surgical masks are composed of three layers. The first two layers are made of 100% polypropylene, while the last layer is made of 80% polyester and 20% cellulose. These proportions may change depending on the manufacturer of the product.
Polypropylene, better known as PP, is the essential component used because of its hydrophobic and absorption capabilities. Because the main component of face masks is plastic, this makes a natural waste management problem because of its extended degradation time ranging from 100 years to 1000 years.
Evidently making it a natural enemy of marine and terrestrial ecosystems.
Are there alternatives to reduce the impact of disposable masks?
Fortunately, for us, YES.
Being composed almost entirely of polypropylene, reducing the damage caused by masks has a certain degree of difficulty. However, polypropylene, being a plastic, contains strength properties that can be of benefit in a number of areas, such as concrete production.
In the United States, a team of researchers at the University of Washington mixed the polypropylene from face masks with a graphene oxide solution. This mixture, when added to cement, improves the strength of concrete.
The addition of polypropylene results in an increase of up to 47% in the 28-day strength of concrete. Such experiments have provided a great alternative to the large quantities of mastics that end up in landfills or worse, in the oceans.
Considering that the cement industry is one of the industries that generate the most greenhouse gas emissions, this would mean a double benefit because it leads to a reduction in waste and carbon emissions.
Another alternative has been developed further south, in Chile, where the Technological Development Unit of the University of Concepción and the Municipality of Concepción, together with Softys, a hygiene and personal care company, launched a project to recycle face masks.
In this project, around 800,000 units were recycled, for a total of 4,000 kilograms. After a sanitization and recycling process, polypropylene pellets are obtained to be used as raw material.
In the following video, there are some ideas of the thousands that can be made using the polypropylene from the masks:
Damage can be stopped before it happens: Reuse before Recycle
Although there are quite innovative and efficient alternatives, we must consider recycling as our last ace up our sleeve. There are more eco-friendly options: reusable masks.
Within the field of reusable masks, there is a wide range of possibilities, however, not all of them have the same protection effectiveness. For example, R40 masks have a 92% bacterial filtration rate and can be reused up to 40 times.
Another alternative among reusable facemasks is cloth facemasks. The cloth acts as a barrier to the spread of small droplets of saliva, the main means of contagion of the coronavirus.
As for the cleaning of these masks, they must be sterilized with hot water, at temperatures up to 70°C, using neutral soaps and without using chemicals that may affect or damage the fabric, such as bleach.
Fabric masks can be washed from 25 to 70 times without losing their filtration capabilities. They have the benefit that their final treatment is simpler since they are made of fabric and can be reused to form other garments, for example.
We all make the change, one step at a time.
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Jr Nicolas de Reduce Entropy🌎