Coronavirus: Shoppers Notice More Used Protective Items Littering Store Parking Lots

ROSEVILLE (CBS13) – People are taking precautions to stay safe during the COVID-19 outbreak but an unwanted side effect is people littering store parking lots with rubber gloves meant to protect them from the virus.

Rebecca Beuttel said she’s been seeing plenty of people protecting themselves at stores in Roseville during the coronavirus pandemic. She told CBS13 not everyone is disposing of their protective masks, gloves and disinfectant wipes into garbage cans.

“We gotta take care of what we can take care of,” Beuttel said.

Others have noticed it too.

“People just leave them in their carts when they come out here and it’s kind of disgusting,” Anthony Booros said.

Beuttel said some are just throwing them on the ground.

“Gloves, masks, tons of baby wipes just thrown on the ground in the parking lots of stores,” Beuttel said.

While going to the Roseville Walmart where Beuttel noticed the litter, CBS13’s camera caught a woman taking off her protective gloves and leaving them in the grocery cart.

Beuttel works as a health care provider. She said that she became more alarmed at the litter problem after taking a client with cerebral palsy who’s unable to wear shoes to the store.

“He was walking on them,” Beuttel said of the improperly discarded materials. “You know, getting out of the car; they were right there on the side of my car.”

John and Loann Thomas said they’ve seen the same thing at Natomas parking lots.

“Just nasty. Just people throwing down germs everywhere,” John Thomas said.

“The trash can’s right there. Birds can it. I mean the trash can’s right there! I don’t get that,” Loann Thomas said.

Sacramento County told CBS13 it’s not their responsibility to clear the litter from any given store’s parking lot.

CBS13 reached out to different grocery chains about if they have heard about these concerns and what their policies are for clearing their parking lots of litter. A spokeswoman for Save Mart Companies said they haven’t heard about these comments or concerns from their customers.

Some shoppers told CBS13 that the solution to this litter problem is simple: practice common courtesy.

“Throw them in the garbage can, fold them inside of each other and throw them away when they get home,” Thomas said.

Sean Freeman, a man shopping with a mask and gloves, said.

“I think it defeats the purpose if you’re going to just toss them on the ground because you need to throw away your own possessions so people won’t get contaminated,” Sean Freeman, a man shopping with a mask and gloves, said.

The folks CBS13 talked to said they felt it’ll more than likely have to be employees who have to pick it all up.