Passerby sparks outrage with photo of strange sighting on local street: 'What is going on here?'

A peculiar photo posted to r/AskUK produced an unfortunate answer.

"What is going on here?" the original poster wrote. "These are stuck all over a rubbish bin in front of the local shops... What are they from?"

Community members were incensed. — Photo Credit: Reddit

The simple answer? Vapes. These are stickers added to disposable vapes that are removed before usage.

Stickers are yet another form of plastic pollution that yields major downsides for humanity. While larger pieces of plastic may end up in massive gyres such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, things including stickers and bags are more likely to end up in landfills, where they degrade into microplastics.

From there, they filter into our waterways and the creatures that live there. Through the food web, those plastics can accumulate in the fish we catch and eat. Once humans eat those fish and the microplastics in them, they can pick up all sorts of endocrine, immune, and reproductive problems.

This is before getting into the e-waste issue presented by vapes. Very few of them are properly recycled, leaving highly toxic chemicals to leach into the land where they're dumped. Once tossed, vape pens can also become a hazard for drivers, litter in wilderness areas, and a threat to wildlife.

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The biggest loss is in all the resources that went into making the vape in the first place. Lithium mining has a steep environmental cost. Tossing lithium batteries is a big waste when the technology to effectively reclaim it exists.

Besides the ecological concerns of vapes, they're just plain bad for your health. Reddit commenters were incensed by the disposable vape phenomenon.

"If they're not throwing lithium batteries onto the floor and into our water supplies, they're putting these stickers all over bins and shop doors," one community member said.

"I honestly think vapes are stealthily going to destroy the planet," another wrote.