Locked up and without contact as nature suffers the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic

By Andrea Toapanta

DreamLAB participant

“There is a deep disinterest on our part with the environment, because it has not yet affected us drastically,” says Damaris Cumbajin, a student and neighbor of the Chillogallo parish. Single-use plastic products, as the name suggests, are no longer useful and cannot be effectively disposed of. However, these had their highest production peak in the pandemic and together with little environmental awareness as citizens.

Plastic has been seen as an enemy that during the health and humanitarian crisis of COVID-19, became the best ally of many. Grocery bags, online order wrappers, plastic food containers delivered right to our doorstep. The same masks -our protectors – have once again cultivated the culture of the massive use of plastic. 2020 hit every human being hard on the globe, as we close the door of our homes and distance ourselves from each other someone else suffers in silence: the environment. Together we can change it.