Metro Vancouver residents threw out 518 million items of PPE last year

BURNABY (NEWS 1130) — More than half a billion items of personal protective equipment were tossed by people in Metro Vancouver last year, which works out to four per resident each week.

The Zero Waste Committee of Metro Vancouver Regional District released this data for this first time Friday.

Gloves — which are counted individually and not as a pair — accounted for the most waste with 371 million units disposed of, whereas masks accounted for 109 million. Forty-eight million synthetic wipes also ended up in the trash.

Terry Fulton, senior project engineer, says while the number seems staggering, PPE only accounted for 0.5. per cent of waste.

“Because of COVID-19 we know that there are potentially more of these than there ever has been before,” he explains.

“There isn’t really any baseline to compare it against, so it’s hard to say whether we’re doing well or not.”

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The report also notes a couple of caveats, saying data was collected before masks were made mandatory in indoor spaces in B.C., and that the number of items discarded by healthcare facilities may have been underestimated.

Fulton says the regional district encourages people to consider reusable options, but recognizes that some people in some situations will opt for a single-use item.

“We recognize there might be some situations where there may be a preference for disposable, and obviously the priority here is keeping the spread of the virus low, but we do encourage the use of reusable masks and gloves where possible,” he says.

“The issue isn’t really them ending up in the garbage, the issue is when they end up in the environment. We really want to encourage residents to not dispose of them on the ground, but to bag them, bin them, put them in the garbage, and keep them out of our environment.”

The region saw an overall decrease in the number of single-use items being discarded when compared with 2018. However, the number of retail bags and containers — items associated with takeout and delivery — increased.

In 2018, 246 million bags were binned, and that number jumped to 318 in million 2020. As for containers, the number rose from 179 million to 269 million.

“As 2020 was not a typical year, these results are not necessarily indicative of any long-term trends in single-use item disposal,” the report notes.

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