City's stark warning to residents amid toilet paper crisis
As shops around the country continue to sell out of toilet paper, residents of a Queensland community have been reminded not to flush wet wipes down the toilet with city officials saying the sewerage system is not equipped to deal with them.
City of Gold Coast shared an image on Friday showing a giant clump of wet wipes that had built up in an underground pipe after hundreds were flushed down the toilet.
Council requested that locals not deposit wipes in the toilet, even if packaging on products claimed it to be “flushable”.
“As the toilet paper crisis continues to unfold, we wanted to share an important reminder about flushable wet wipes,” their post to Facebook read.
“While they seem to disappear out of view down your loo, they're actually causing major issues in our pipes.”
Council used the play on words: “Let's not get backed up” to illustrated its point, with the light-hearted reminder attracting widespread approval from hundreds of people in comments to the post.
“Once again please only flush the three Ps – pee, poo and (toilet) paper. Other types of paper, including kitchen paper, and wipes can block our city pipes,” the council added in a comment.
Many people agreed it was unnecessary and harmful to the environment to flush wet wipes.
“Flushable wipes are totally unnecessary! Bad for the environment and pipes,” one person wrote.
Some expressed confusion over why the product was labelled as flushable when really they were not safe to be flushed.
In response, a council employee wrote: “Not everything that is ‘flushable’ should be flushed”.
Last year The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) took producer of so-called “flushable” wet wipes brand Kimberly-Clark Australia to court, accusing it of misleading customers.
The suit was was ultimately unsuccessful, as there was no evidence to verify sewerage blockages were the direct result of the wipes despite images of huge piles of wipes that failed to break down.
There have been manic scenes inside shopping centres across the country as shoppers rush to panic buy toilet paper amid the coronavirus outbreak, which has so far infected more than 60 Australians.
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