It's trivial to stop the fatbergs caused due to flushable wipes if city administrations spend a few minutes thinking about why people use flushable wipes instead of spending time and money in celebrity campaigns [1] against them.

The conclusion is obvious – wiping with dry toilet paper is an inefficient, unhygienic, and sometimes painful way of cleaning yourself after defecation. Hence, people use wet wipes to "feel fresher", as the advertisements euphemistically put it.

The solution is also quite straightforward – go all the way and replace most uses of toilet paper with bidets or washlets, following the lead of smart nations like Japan. Wet wipe usage will automatically plummet. City planners all over the world should be running campaigns promoting bidet usage and partnering with washlet companies instead of sternly wagging their fingers at wet wipe users.

----------------------------------------

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/oct/14/andy-serkis-p...