Buy cotton buds with paper or bamboo stems, or a washable silicone bud, and never flush any of them. Better, use fewer: ears clean themselves.
Plastic-stem buds have been banned in England since 2020 and across the EU since 2021. At about 0.3 g per stem, 200 buds a year is around 60 g, small in mass but a persistent beach-litter item.
The catch: paper stems bend, and reusable silicone buds are a synthetic polymer that is not recyclable; the biggest win is using fewer.