Half of all regular smokers believe it is acceptable to discard cigarette butts down the drain – despite expert warnings about the risk it poses to marine wildlife, a survey has suggested.
A study for environment charity Keep Britain Tidy found 52% of daily smokers polled said they did not see a problem with getting rid of their cigarette butts in this way.
Meanwhile, only 53% of those surveyed said they realised ends would finish up in the sea when dropped down the drain.
Nearly two in every five smokers (39%) polled said they had discarded a butt in this way during the last month, despite 77% of them saying they were concerned that toxins from their cigarettes can harm marine life.
The survey of 4,146 people – including 502 smokers – was carried out by YouGov to mark the launch of Keep Britain Tidy’s Flicking Blue Murder campaign, raising awareness of the link between cigarettes and the marine environment.
It comes after the BBC’s Blue Plant II series, presented by Sir David Attenborough, which raised the profile of the oceans’ plight.
Keep Britain Tidy chief executive Allison Ogden-Newton said: “Following Sir David Attenborough’s rallying cry to reduce plastic waste on Blue Planet II, we wanted to show how simple everyday behaviour can affect the environment.
“While flicking a cigarette down the drain may not seem harmful, we need to ensure smokers understand that this has a direct and often drastic impact on wildlife.
“We need to challenge this view [that discarding cigarettes in this way is acceptable] and get the message to smokers that this is still littering.
“It’s encouraging to see that so many smokers were very concerned about the impact of their cigarette butts on marine life, and we hope that this research will further educate the public about the effects of smoking-related litter.”
- Keep Britain Tidy and Sea Life Manchester will be creating an installation on Wednesday with three giant cigarette butts to show the effects of discarding such litter.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel