LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The newest type of litter can be found in parking lots around the country - gloves worn for a trip to the store now thrown on the ground.
"First of all, it's litter," Clark County Health Department Administrator Laura Lindley said. "They should not be throwing them on the ground because then someone else just has to retrieve them and risk contamination themselves."
That part might be obvious, but Lindley and other professionals are questioning whether people should even be wearing gloves in the first place.
"Anyone that is not used to wearing gloves, they're going to either forget they have them on or they're just going to ignore them," she said.
The CDC has recommended people to wear masks or cloth coverings when they go out to areas where there may be other people, like the grocery store, but the CDC has not made the same recommendation when it comes to gloves. The CDC said gloves are still not a replacement for proper hand hygiene and health professionals are worried that people may not be using them properly to prevent cross-contamination.
"A lot of people just think once the glove is on, they're protected and they're not when they're touching their face," Lindley said.
Beyond that, gloves may also give people a false sense of security, which could be dangerous if people do not also practice proper hygiene.
"If you weren't wearing gloves, you would be more conscious of using hand sanitizer or washing your hands," she said. "People think once they have gloves on, they're good to go and that's just not the case."
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