Macleans has a great story on the battle of the bags. The EnviroCommunists in Toronto want people to be bagless while the vice-president of the Canadian Plastics Industry Association is advocating for plastic bags. Recently, Toronto had passed a law requiring all stores to “charge a five cents per bag fee to discourage their use.” However, during an audit of its street litter (yes, they audit the street litter), it was discovered that out of 4,300 individual pieces of garbage at 300 sites citywide, just six pieces of litter were plastic retail shopping bags.

Glenn de Baeremaeker, a Toronto councillor and a rabid EnviroCommunist who engineered the bag bylaw, says “The plastic bag is a symbol of our wasteful and gluttonous lifestyle. It all has to change.” During testing conducted by Dr. Richard Summerbell, the former chief of medical mycology for Ontario, it was discovered that the EnviroBags are loaded with bacteria.

The tests found surprisingly high levels of bacteria in two-thirds of the reusable bags. One-third had levels above those set for safe drinking water. The fact that some people used the bags to carry items other than food­—gym clothes or beer empties—greatly increased the risk.

“This study provides strong evidence that reusable bags could pose a significant risk to the safety of the food supply if used to transport food from store to home,” Dr. Summerbell concluded. He recommended that all meat be double-wrapped before being placed in reusable bags and that the bags themselves be washed and discarded regularly. None of the throwaway bags were found to be contaminated in any way.