Make leaf blowing illegal

Why I think leaf blowing is particularly dangerous for COVID-19 spread

When we talk about the survival time of viruses on surfaces, we’ve been seeing research about man-made services: copper, cardboard, plastic, steel.

The ground is a much more complex environment. There are bits and pieces of things. There’s moisture. There are nutrients. It would require a serious scientific study to determine what sorts of ground environments are best for survival of the virus.

There was an article a couple of weeks ago in Scientific American where they described a Chinese scientist who discovered a virus and 97% similar to this one in a bat cave in China in 2013. From this, most scientists have concluded that the virus did originate in a bat cave. Bat caves have complex environments, as well.

Consider the ground, in a cool, moist, spring environment. The underside of a small leaf bit could be an ideal place for a virus to hide from the disinfecting ultraviolet rays of the sun. Using a high-powered blower to rocket that leaf bit into the air could be a very dangerous way of aerosolizing the virus.

This is a pandemic. We know people have been coughing and spitting all over the place. The virus could be literally anywhere.

I doubt that there has been time to do a careful scientific study of the effects of leaf blowing right now. We cannot rely on previous studies of the effects of leaf blowing to understand the consequences of this activity on covid-19.

I call upon the state of New York to declare leaf blowing Illegal. Also power mowers without bags should be illegal.