Waste from face masks fill 166 six-tonner trucks daily —DENR

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) said Thursday the waste from face masks fills 166 six-tonner trucks every day.

At the Laging Handa public briefing, DENR Undersecretary Jonas Leones said that around 1,000 metric tons of waste from face masks are being collected daily.

“Ibig sabihin kung six-tonner yung ating truck, 166 na trucks ang lumalabas kada araw para kolektahin ang mga waste na ito (It means if we use six-tonner trucks, 166 of them go out every day to collect this waste)," he said.

The DENR has been coordinating with local government units especially in the barangay level to make sure they are strictly following the Solid Waste Management Act.

Barangay governments are in charge of collecting waste from households and taking them to a “transfer station”, where the municipal governments will pick them up.

In turn, the municipal government will transport the collected waste to their final destination such as landfills and treatment facilities, according to the DENR official.

On Tuesday, the World Health Organization warned that the vast amount of waste produced in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic poses a threat to human and environmental health.

The tens of thousands of tons of extra medical waste has caused a huge strain on healthcare waste management systems, the WHO said in a report.

According to the UN health agency, the extra waste is "threatening human and environmental health and exposing a dire need to improve waste management practices.” —LBG/KG, GMA News