Most people do not realize that cigarette butts are the most littered item in the ocean. Indeed they are a small trash the size of a pinky, but that does not mean that cigarette butts are a small matter. Cigarette butts are a common trash that can also be found on beaches all around the world. As a littered item, like all other ocean trash, it pollutes the ocean and endangers marine life. Many marine lives will mistake it for food and eat it. Cigarette butts contain dangerous chemicals, along with foam that makes it float on water, and into which contains plastic. The plastic contained inside a cigarette’s filter from a cigarette butt is cellulose acetate plastic, which is a form of plastic that stays in the environment. It is difficult to decompose where it need at least 10 years in before being able to decompose. The cigarette’s filter itself will break into really small particles making it a micro plastic and a microfiber that will contribute to water pollution. Due to this, according to a team of researchers from San Diego University (Thomas Novotny, a Public Health Professor) explain that cigarette butts including the filter inside it contaminates the ocean more compared to plastic straws or any other trash. Cigarettes butts are categorized as a hazardous trash because they contain up to 400 kinds of dangerous chemicals, which among them are nicotine, and various heavy metal (arsenic, lead (Pb), chopper, chromium, cadmium).* San Diego State University study shows that one stick of cigarette in one liter of water is enough to kill half of the total of fishes exposed. The lethal dose (LD 50) for fishes = 1 cigarette stick per liter of water. Based on the data from Ocean Conservancy in year 2018, there are 2.4 million tons of cigarette butts in the ocean that threatens the existence of marine biota’s ecosystem. Even in the year 2040, it is predicted that we will no longer be able to consume fish, shrimp, crab, and any other marine species as a result of the ocean being polluted by cigarette butts.

In order to raise awareness of the danger of cigarette butts to marine life, I am participating in the 2020 global media competition held by GGTC (Global Center for Good Governance in Tobacco Control). The 2020 global media competition’s theme this year is “Expose Tobacco Industry Manipulation, Save the Next Generation” that is in accordance with World Health Organization’s World No Tobacco Day theme. World No Tobacco Day itself is held every year on 31 May in order to promote a healthy lifestyle without cigarettes. The creation I submitted is a poster that has a visual of a sea turtle eating cigarette butts.

My poster is shortlisted as a finalist.  Please give your support by clicking the Like button on the poster here:

https://www.facebook.com/TheGGTC/photos/a.311400542765796/698493117389868/?type=3&theater

Thank you everyone for stopping by to like and share the post.

Reference:

* Slaughter, Elli et al. Toxicity of cigarette butts, and their chemical components, to marine and freshwater fish.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3088407/