According to experts, COVID waste management remains a concern

Biomedical waste management has also become a major source of concern as the country addresses the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic and overwhelms healthcare facilities.

CPCB guidelines

Covid waste is infectious and must be treated scientifically. The Central Contamination Control Board (CPCB) has developed guidelines for the treatment, diagnosis, and quarantine of waste generated during the treatment, diagnosis, and quarantine of Covid-19 patients, and has developed guidelines for the safe collection, transportation, and disposal of Covid waste. Promotes waste generators and common disposal facilities for disposal. ..

According to CPCB, there are 198 Common Biomedical Waste Management and Public Cleansing Facilities (CBWTF) involved in the treatment and disposal of biomedical waste. Since February, biomedical waste has gradually increased from 53 tonnes (TPD) to 203 TPD per day, but this remains less than the increase in patient numbers, primarily due to proper waste separation. was.

However, according to Biotic, one of the largest biomedical waste treatment facilities in Delhi, Covid-related waste generated in July last year was about 7.2 tonnes per day. By the end of April 2021, this had increased to 12.5 to 13 tonnes per day. In cities like Gurgram, there is only one government-approved CBWTF for collection, transportation, and processing.

“Since the pandemic, CBWTF has faced unprecedented demand in the residential community alone for the collection and treatment of COVID-19 biomedical waste. The bigger challenges are the 2016 Biomedical Waste Management Regulations and the 2016 Solids. Insufficient compliance with central guidelines such as waste management regulations has helped reduce hazardous waste, “said Gurpreet Sandhu, Chairman of the Healthcare & Pharma Council.

Future difficulties

Meanwhile, Priti Banthia Mahesh, chief program coordinator for Toxics Link, a third wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, where many flawed current systems can make it difficult to manage future waste. Warns about the possibility of.

“… this will be difficult because most of the state’s health facilities do not have access to the CBWTF that processes waste,” she said, also pointing out the looting that is taking place in waste management. ..

“The treatment facility pays for Covid’s waste individually. In that scenario, we find that there is great concern because many masks and gloves are thrown away or sold after treatment. There is a facility, but unfortunately there is some waste that has not landed or leaked into the facility, “Mahesh said.

It was also a big issue whether regulators had sufficient capacity to monitor the disposal of waste, which was not easy in the era of pandemics.

There are clear guidelines for the disposal of waste generated during home quarantine, which must be separated and treated separately. However, experts say that municipalities across the country have few systems in place to collect them, and the gap is clearly visible in the second wave of Covid.

Also, are workers well trained to dispose of waste, as there have been many reports that they are at risk of infection and that waste workers have been infected with the virus and lost many lives? There are some concerns, Mahesh said. “For the promotion of vaccination, we also need to be careful about how the generated vaccine waste is treated and out of the wrong hands.” She added.

Now that the virus has spread to rural areas, it is necessary to raise public awareness of these guidelines. Medical facilities are not connected to the CBWTF, as some states do not have sufficient waste treatment facilities, which could exacerbate further infectious diseases, Mahesh said.