Earth Day 2020: New Orleans, Memphis part of US Big Litter Cities

By STEVE SPACEK litterscorecard.com TWITTER@litterscorecard

April 20, 2020 -- New Orleans and Memphis are among the USA’s 15 Biggest, Litter Polluted Cities, where littering and dumping of potentially virus-breeding waste is visible, widespread. This information comes as people celebrate the 50th Earth Day April 22 during the coronavirus outbreak, said Steve Spacek, director of the American States Litter Scorecard and a public performance specialist.

New Orleans, along with Miami, Detroit, Baltimore--all CDC-noted hotbeds for Covid-19 cases, and Memphis, Houston, Philadelphia, San Antonio, Fort Worth, Indianapolis, Nashville, Atlanta--communities with lesser “case totals, make for the 15 cities with 375,000-plus populations, Spacek said. Choices were made using indicators from published sources, including the U.S. Census Bureau, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NTHSA), municipalities and reports by Busy Bee Cleaning, TRAVEL+LEISURE and Forbes.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency and revered health science journals, solid wastes are able to breed and transmit fatal viruses and diseases--Tetanus, Hepatitis A, Malaria, Zika, even Covid-19, said Spacek. As wastes, cigarette filters, paper food packaging, plastic beverage containers and retail -issued bags can enter waterways, then ate by seafood caught and sold for human consumption. World newscasting concurs the coronavirus developed last November from diseased animal remains sold with impunity at “open-air” markets in Wuhan, China, he said.

Data from the NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) indicates over 800 persons have died each year since 2010-- roughly 3 Americans killed per day-- from vehicular-majority encounters with un-removed waste and related debris upon roads, sidewalks, trails and in parks. These life-ending incidents, reported exclusively to NHTSA by state police agencies, can occur anytime and under all types of weather, Spacek said. In 2017, New Orleans was a top US city for these fatalities, he added.

Since the first Earth Day in 1970, five decades of Gallup polls find “a majority of Americans have great concern for pollution and its management by government,” said Spacek. “The cities of New Orleans and Memphis are big-time failures to citizens. Elected city and parish officials, workers, contractors acted lax. Filthy public spaces were not cleaned. Little to no waste reductions, almost zero support to reuse and recycle thrown-away items. Sadly, as a highly-littered coronavirus hotbed, New Orleans appears to be paying an ultimate price for not duly practicing Green virtues: avertible deaths.“