COVID-19-related personal protective equipment (PPE) contamination in the highly urbanized southeast Brazilian coast

Personal protective equipment (PPE) pollution driven by the COVID-19 pandemic in coastal environment, Southeast Coast of India

“…The mean densities found in this paper are comparable to previous studies, as presented in Table 2 . The density registered in this paper was much lower than values reported from Lima, Peru ( De-la-Torre et al, 2021b ), Argentina ( De-la-Torre et al, 2022 ), Brazil ( Ribeiro et al, 2022 ), Ethiopia ( Aragaw et al, 2022 ), Iran ( Hatami et al, 2022 ) and Agadir, Morocco ( Ben Haddad et al, 2021 ). Simultaneously, the mean density was lower than that reported from the beaches of the Cox's Bazar coast ( Rakib et al, 2021 ) and the Chilean coast ( Thiel et al, 2021 ).…”

“…Face shields and hazard suits were not found in the beaches. The predominance of face masks has been reported in coastal zones of different countries, including Morocco ( Ben Haddad et al, 2021 ; Mghili et al, 2022), Peru ( De-la-Torre et al, 2021b ; De-la-Torre et al, 2022 ), Bangladesh ( Rakib et al, 2021 ), Brazil ( Ribeiro et al, 2022 ), Ethiopia ( Aragaw et al, 2022 ) and Iran ( Hatami et al, 2022 ). In Argentina, however, the number of gloves equaled to the number of face masks (48% each) found in 15 sites along the coast ( De-la-Torre et al, 2022 ).…”

“…Recently, Wang et al (2022) documented the release of microplastics from gloves. Reusable masks are also important sources of microplastics ( Ribeiro et al, 2022 ). In our study, some face masks showed some degree of physical degradation (e.g., torn layers, Fig.…”

Occurrence of COVID-19 personal protective equipment (PPE) litters along the eastern coast of Palawan Island, Philippines

“…These COVID-19-related waste materials also contribute to and generate a multitude of plastic wastes eventually deposited from a wasteland into rivers, beaches, and coasts resulting in the intrusion of plastic litters in marine environments ( Benson et al, 2021 ). There are worldwide anecdotal reports of improper disposal and occurrence of PPE litters in various coastal areas ( De-la-Torre and Aragaw, 2021 ; Mghili et al, 2022 ; Aragaw et al, 2022 ; Ribeiro et al, 2022 ; Ben Haddad et al, 2021 ) with approximately 3.4 billion single-use facemasks or face shields being discarded daily ( Benson et al, 2021 ). It was reported that 1.56 billion facemasks are now deposited in the vast oceans ( OceansAsia, 2020 ).…”

“…However, the province of Palawan has a higher PPE litter density than Peru, Argentina ( De-la-Torre and Aragaw, 2021 ; De-la-Torre et al, 2022a ), Chile ( Thiel et al, 2021 ), Bangladesh ( Rakib et al, 2021 ), Canada ( Ammendolia et al, 2021 ), and Brazil ( Ribeiro et al, 2022 ) ( Table 2 ). The majority of these published studies collated PPE litters over a 12-week period, while this study only conducted a single survey campaign.…”