The shutdown of many businesses and activities during the coronavirus lockdown resulted in a significant reduction in fossil-fuel use, and the low oil prices make it cheaper to make plastic from fossil fuels instead of recycling plastic. And this leads to lower demand and lower prices for recyclables — in many cases, they now go straight from your recycling bin to the landfill.
At the same time, the pandemic caused an increased demand for protective gear for essential workers, much of which is single-use items made of plastic. Much of the food prepared by restaurants and other businesses is now sold ‘to go’. Even when being picked up (or delivered) for a meal at home, many of these to-go meals are packed in styrofoam and accompanied by single-use plastic utensils. Both add to the glut of plastic in the environment and the toxic pollution of our land, water, and soil.
Most plastics gradually break down into finer and finer particles, and the micro-particles wind up in our air, water, and soil — and then into the food we eat. Although less dramatic than the pandemic, this is a huge threat to public health.
In many cases, re-usable PPE would be cheaper to use and would help eliminate the tons of. Food-serving businesses could greatly reduce their part by providing single-use utensils only when the customer needs them, by using packaging made from bamboo or paper, and never using styrofoam.
Yes, it would take some creativity and adaptation to make these ideas work, but failing to do so is killing us. (Literally.) It may be less dramatic and less visible than the death toll from the pandemic — especially in the US and other countries that refused to adopt well-established methods for dealing with this type of pandemic, but it will kill more people in the long run.
On top of all that, plastic manufacturing is very energy-intensive, so every bit of plastic they manufacture also makes the climate emergency even more severe. And climate change is already killing people through extreme heat events, flooding, sea-level rise, increased wildfire activity, more intense storms, and flooding. While everyone should do everything possible to reduce their own carbon footprint, we need system change — we need to stop subsidizing fossil fuels, stock allowing any new fossil fuel infrastructure — from extraction to pipelines to natural gas hookups — to be built or expanded. As with food packaging and service-ware, this will require considerable creativity & ingenuity. Ultimately, however, there is no choice if we want to survive.