Disposable vapes have become a frequent nuisance with people leaving them anywhere and everywhere, as one woman recently noted.
On TikTok, Less Waste Laura (@lesswastelaura) shared a video of a terra cotta pot full of disposable vapes she found on a walk.
@lesswastelaura Disposable vapers disrespecting their surroundings. Another full pot of litter picked vapes! #BanDisposableVapes ♬
"Disposable vapers disrespecting their surroundings. Another full pot of litter picked vapes!" she wrote in the caption for her video.
More and more people are using vape pens or e-cigarettes, approximately 4.5% of adults as of 2021, per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. What's more worrying is that a significant number of young people — an estimated 1.63 million middle and high school students — are vape users, according to The Truth Initiative.
Vape pens pose the same health problems associated with traditional cigarettes, along with a few additional ones associated with the heavy metals, like nickel and lead, contained within them that are inhaled through the vapor, per UC Davis.
With increased usage comes an increase in waste and greater risks not only to people's health, but to the environment as well. Their lithium-ion batteries pose a fire risk during charging and are often thrown away instead of recycled, where they sit in landfills, or, in the case of people littering, sit in yards, sidewalks, and roadways, where they can leach chemicals into the soil and water.
They can cause immediate physical damage, like puncturing tires, dirtying yards and parks, or even ending up in the possession of animals, like a penguin that held one in its mouth (but did not appear to ingest it).
People in the comments of the video were just as shocked by the littering and waste from the vape pens.
One person wrote they "don't understand how people just throw things on the ground randomly."
Another person said they, like the OP, take a walk in their neighborhood and do litter pickup, writing, "The discarded vapes and their packaging are abundant here too."
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