A recent study found that more than 25,000 tons of pandemic-related plastic waste leaked into the ocean while 8 million tons of plastic waste were created globally.
Personal protective equipment like masks and gloves from the COVID-19 pandemic were mismanaged as there was too much waste for countries to properly process the materials, according to a study entitled "Plastic waste release caused by COVID-19 and its fate in the global ocean" published in the online journal PNAS.
