In the “you just can’t make this stuff up” department~while the City of Vancouver has banned the use of plastic straws for 2019 they have designed something made of plastic for smokers. The intent is for smokers to carry around this little green plastic container for the butt end of cigarettes. The tweet above shows the item and suggests what a great idea it is in this dry weather for smokers to use this freebie from the city.
The Clean Air Coalition of B.C. states that tobacco use in the province is the lowest in the country, but still costs the B.C. economy 2.3 billion dollars for health care costs, sick time and lower productivity. The City of Vancouver called cigarette butts the leading item of litter in 2013 and actually counted 9,000 butts along three blocks of downtown commercial streets. In 2013 Council considered a “cigarette butt refund program”.
It is doubtful that the people dropping 6,000 butts in downtown commercial streets are going to be carrying around a little green container for butts. And as for the straw ban, it turns out that it was a nine-year old boy named Milo Cress who came up with the figure that 500 million straws are used a day in the United States, and that figure has not been substantiated.
Information is already circulating that the straw ban is a relatively small item to target for the environment, but will have a big impact on seniors and people with disabilities requiring these items to drink.
As The Outline.com observed “Advocates for people with disabilities have pointed out that those with physical conditions such as cerebral palsy may have difficulty sipping out of regular cups, or using paper straws. Straws are comparably much smaller than larger pieces of plastic pollution, such as fishing nets, making it much more difficult to get an accurate estimate of how much we’re using and consuming. More to the point, consumer waste is a drop in the bucket compared to, say, giant corporations propping up fossil fuels.
Milo Cress the boy who made the estimate about straws in the environment is 16 years of age now and has a surprising take on the banning of plastic straws.
“If people are forced not to use straws, then they won’t necessarily see that it’s for the environment. They’ll just think it’s just another inconvenience imposed on them by government.”
And the last word goes to Bob Kronbauer on Twitter, founder of Vancouver is Awesome:
https://twitter.com/BobKronbauer/status/1020901807139127297
I find this whole business of banning plastic straws ludicrous when one looks at the water/soft drink aisles in the grocery stores.
Do you suggest doing nothing until the day we can do everything? Is something wrong with one step at a time? Plastic bottles will have their day too as, I hope, all single-use plastics.
Meanwhile, cigarette buts are made of nasty plastics contaminated with the terrible chemicals that didn’t end up in the smokers lungs. They make up a really high volume of the stuff that gets washed into street drains and often directly into the ocean. A plastic container is an improvement if people actually use them. It should be required that you show you have one in order to buy a pack of smokes.
*butts*
Here’s an idea: why not have cigarette packs include a butt container as part of their design?