San Francisco bans reusable grocery bags
 

San Francisco has now banned reusable grocery bags and has brought back the formerly maligned plastic grocery bags that many thought were a leading cause of our demise. Turns out that the filthy (in many cases) reusable bags were helping to spread the virus and who knows what else.

San Francisco bans reusable bags in coronavirus fight | TheHill

The irony is obvious. Turns out that green is unclean in this instance.

Many other questions arise about the wisdom of some otherwise trendy and “eco-friendly” policies bestowed upon us by the more enlightened in our society. That’s probably best left to separate threads.

In the meantime, I wonder if SF will re-institute the use of reusable bags when the crisis is over?

I feel bad for the turtles.....:ohdear:

I can understand that but do you feel strongly enough then to outlaw the use of plastic bags?

Seriously, I was kidding. I shouldn't have joked about that, now the turtle lovers will come after me.

Have no fear. Turtle lovers will never catch you.

yes

What this shows is that the government in San Francisco pays attention to events and adjusts its regulations as needed. What an awful example of how the government should work. They, like so many other areas, felt that the risk/benefit analysis in normal conditions justified banning plastic bags due to the well establish danger to the environment.

When the risk/benefit changed to now perhaps those reused bags being a Covid risk they altered the policy. In this situation the plastic bags were safer at least in the short term.

Scoff all you like, but I see this as how government should work. Agile and concerned both with human life and with the world. Imagine actually using science to influence policy.

:coolsmiley:

So, my reusable cloth bags in my trunk inferior for two weeks plus still have virus living in the fabric. Amazing, we are NEVER going to get rid of it.

You do know you’re talking about SF right. They have big section just off downtown the cops and EMT’s won’t go in with armor protection.

Yes, science is good (a strawman) and it's pretty easy to imagine. But I think most of the urge was a combination of SF lefties feeling good and virtue signalling. Look, I'm a nice person and saving the planet. Hey, just my two cents.

Yours would pass muster. The issue was regular users never ever cleaned the reusable bags and were filthy .. in some cases, disgusting according to what I've read.

I don't blame them ... in the least.

I don't have the stats at hand but other effects of soft-headed social policies and virtue signalling, among other things, also make SF a car thief's paradise. The cops don't typically respond due to frequency. It's a beautiful dystopia in some ways.

I’ve had personnel at Publix tell me that they don’t even want to touch some of the reusable bags people use as they’re dirty and nasty and smelly. Why not just go back to the paper bags we all grew up with. They’re reusable for so many things and can easily be recycled.

Agree. Common sense should trump emotion, or so it would seem

Great, bring back the dog poop bags that are a bonus with the groceries : )

Reusable bags not SFs big problem...
 

San Francisco has a MUCH bigger issue. It has been shown that Coronavirus is transferred through human waste and their city is awash in it.from their massive homeless population. They have a staff of folks who.clean it daily, but it is still a massive problem just from the smell. It would be practically impossible to effectively sanitise sidewalks and streets, so the virus could linger for a day or two. Yikes!

Crazy place. Don't know why anyone lives there

Thank you. It’s so nice to read a thoughtful reply to a complex situation.

Lefties??

Paper has always been “green”... recyclable, renewable.... and it made great kites and book covers!

Reusable bags have been around for years and can harbor bacteria if not washed but this virus has just appeared. There is bacteria everywhere and, for the most part, we are resistant anyway, this virus is not bacteria! Canvas bags for shopping are the best. Throw them in the washer to clean. Plastic bag companies would love to take advantage of this opportunity to make money because they have had their business threatened by the use of reusable bags. Do not let people use this as an excuse to USE US.

How should we wash these for use at our stores here in the Villages?

Found this--

How To Clean Reusable Grocery Bags - Tips for Cleaning Grocery Shopping Bags

Have been to SF and amazingly they keep reelecting their city council.

It has not been shown that Coronavirus is transferred through human waste. Your statement as if it were a fact, is a misunderstanding of the established studies. For feces to be infectious requires two things.

1. That there are intact viruses in the feces.
2. That there are sufficient numbers of intact viruses to transmit disease [infectious dose].

It has been shown that stool can be PCR positive for Covid. That is not the same as intact virus. The PCR test looks for pieces of the virus. Thus if a virus were in your throat and you swallowed it and that virus were destroyed by travel through the GI system, the virus itself is "dead" but the PCR could still be positive. In fact that is what may be happening. HERE is a review in Nature, one of the leading science journals. Included is this important information

As to #2 [no pun opportunity should be missed] The quantity of virus needed has not been fully established. It is known that some viruses only require a small number of particles to sicken a person while others require a large quantity. Thus even if there are some "live" intact virus in the feces it would need to be shown that the exposure is greater than the threshold for infection.

This is not to say that feces could not be an alternative agent of transmission. Just that your claim is inaccurate.

You can throw those reusable bags in the washing machine.

I don't know how I feel about turtles. I know the globe is warming, but right now this is grasping at straws, God forgive me, I didn't aim for it to be a pun. We need to list the things that are most important right now, not in the scheme of things. Now is not the time to argue how to save the planet, I think all reasonable people know we need to. Now is not the time to anger ourselves about how this virus MAY have begun. Now is the time to save our scrawny necks and try to help. It may be the last days of some of our lives. Stay safe all. I am so glad I haven't been put in time out again. I think it is so good to read everyone's thoughts on here, even the ones we don't agree with.. I request that the bad people be let out of time out. There is always a little bit of bad in the best of us and a little bit of good in the worst of us.

Hopefully, they are once again wearing clothes when they frequent restaurants. Not that I care what happens to SF (or Kalifornika for that matter).

================================================== ===================
I use insulated bags, like Cosco's or Sam's, for fresh meats, ice cream and the like. I ask for paper bags for the rest of the groceries because plastic will let viruses live longer on them than paper.

When I return home, I put all my paper bags in a safe place in the garage...off the floor and leave them there for about 1 day (since any virus will die within that time on paper/cardboard.

My wife disinfects a section of our countertop where I put the rest of the groceries: boxes, cans, glass containers, bagged goods. Then I wipe everything with antiseptic alcohol wipes, and move the groceries one by one to their storage place. The paper bags are trashed immediately. I wash my hands two-four times during this whole thing. The insulated zip bags are opened...usual wiping of each item, and the groceries are put into the fridge. Wife then Lysol's the bag interiors and exteriors. Bags are put back into the car for next food purchase. This journey takes about 1/2 hour, but the psychological relief is deserved and appreciated.

Your decontamination process is excellent and others can benefit from it. We use something similar when we receive groceries now from Instacart.

CDC should have seen this coming if they were on top of everything and doing their job...and mandated that all grocery stores in SF ban re-usable shopping bags and go to good old paper back in January

but, then the 'protect the forest' people would have been up in arms

there's far less that care about the turtles, so I can see why SF went with plastic

gosh, the poor folks in SF must have been crying in their café latte over this one

:1rotfl:

They are doing this where my sister lives in PA also.

They responded promptly and thoroughly to my daughter's car being stolen. Did a great job of finding it and holding onto it for her until the insurance co. decided to total it due to the drug infested condition the thieves left it in.

No turtles were harmed in the making of this candy.
Turtle Candy Recipe With Pecans and Caramel

They will go back to reusable bags because they care about the environment. Might not be politically correct to care, but they do. Caring is also why, during the pandemic, they are not allowing the use of reusable bags in case others are infected by them in the grocery store. I have to wonder about people who seem to enjoy being critical about this.

"...they care."

That's usually the beginning of a problem. All you have to do is "care" as opposed to actually do something to solve a problem.

I don't enjoy being critical but rather get frustrated with what amounts to virtue signalling.

my vote for best joke of the year

Apparently they are not bringing back plastic bags. The virus remains active on plastic almost as long as on metal. SF is apparently requiring paper bags which give the virus a short period of activity and are biodegradable.