Use of face masks in India during COVID-19: A study on sanitization, disposal practices

Covid-19 has made an everlasting impact on many aspects of life resulting in a ‘new normal’ way of life. The regime to combat the coronavirus entails hands, face, and space; involving hand wash, using face masks and maintaining social distance. Wearing a mask has become an absolute necessity and is finding a place in the wardrobes of people from all walks of life. The sanitization, disposal of masks by the mask users has been reported in the study. Most (48%) people indicated that a disposable mask was used only once before discarding them, but it was alarming to note that a significant percent used a disposable mask for 2–3 times (16%) before discarding. A startling revelation was that majority of the respondents (53%) used a reusable mask more than 3 times before washing. The reusable mask was washed by 60 per cent of respondents after first use whereas 31 per cent used it for 2–3 times wear cycles and 9 per cent used it more than 3 times before washing. A notable observation was that an additional disinfectant rinse was given after washing with soap seemingly to compensate for its overuse. A surprising practice detected to discard disposable masks was to wrap them in a separate polythene cover and then subsequently throwing in the dustbin (47.20%), followed by throwing them in the dustbin as it is (37.50%), and a significant percentage of green users (15.40%) took care to burn the used up disposable masks. Most subjects (84.20%) felt mask wearing was affordable while 17.60 per cent found it to be unaffordable. High price of the disposable masks proved to be a major factor (46.80%) in non-affordability of the masks. However, proper education on disposable and reusable mask usage and disposal must be given to the general population through social media.