新冠肺炎导致塑料垃圾激增

Coronavirus is causing a flurry of plastic waste. Campaigners fear it may be permanent

新冠肺炎导致塑料垃圾激增，环保人士担心这可能是永久性的

All of the defining images of the coronavirus pandemic seem to feature one thing: plastic.

所有关于新冠流行病毒的映像都包含着一个东西：塑料。

Surgical masks, gloves, protective equipment, body bags--the Covid-19 crisis has spurred a rapid expansion in the production of desperately-needed plastic products, with governments racing to boost their stockpiles and regular citizens clamoring for their share of supplies.

医用口罩、手套、防护装备、尸袋——疫情危机促使的塑料产品的需求急速上升，生产迅速扩张，各国政府争着增加的库存，普通民众也要求拿到供应物资。

Such production is necessary. But all that plastic ends up somewhere--and environmental campaigners fear it is just the tip of a looming iceberg, with the pandemic causing a number of serious challenges to their efforts to reduce plastic pollution.

诸如此类的生产是必要的。但所有这些塑料最终都要被丢弃到某个地方，环保人士担心这只是冰山一角，因为全球疫情给他们减少塑料污染的努力带来了一系列严重挑战。

From people discarding plastic gloves and masks in cities across the world to important regulations on the use of plastic being scrapped, rolled back or delayed, the problem has taken a back seat during one of the most significant public health crises of modern times.

在这个重大的公共卫生事件面前，世界各地城市中人们都在丢弃塑料手套和口罩的问题，有关废弃、回收利用或延迟使用塑料的重要规定都退居次要地位。

The implications of those trends could spell years of trouble for our already polluted oceans.

这些趋势所造成的影响可能会给我们已经受污染多年的海洋带来长久的麻烦。

We know that plastic pollution is a global problem--it existed before the pandemic, Nick Mallos of US-based NGO Ocean Conservancy tells CNN. "(But) we've seen a lot of industry efforts to roll back some of the great progress that's been made.

众所周知，塑料污染是一个全球性的问题——它在疫情流行之前就存在了，美国非政府组织海洋保护协会的尼克.马洛斯在接受CNN的采访时表示：“(但是)我们已经看到了许多行业的努力，以争取不让我们以前所取得的巨大进步付诸东流。

We need to be quite cautious about where we go, post-pandemic, Mallos adds.

马洛斯补充说，在疫情过后，我们需要非常谨慎地考虑我们的未来去向。