Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (Pak-EPA) has strictly instructed all the hospitals of Pakistan dealing with Coronavirus patients to ensure proper dumping of COVID-19 waste.
The Pak-EPA further instructed that all the hospitals to completely destroy the waste used in the treatment of Covid-19 patients. All hospitals are advised to completely destroy the waste including plastic instead of recycling as a protective measure to limit the further spread of the coronavirus.
Director General Pak-EPA, Farzana Altaf said waste material, which can be recycled and then reused, also needs to be destroyed completely at hospitals to reduce chances of spreading Coronavirus in a country.
She informed that we must make sure that the waste produced while treating the patients of Covid-19 is properly disposed and incinerated due to the significance of this virus.
She further informed that the material which can be recycled and then reused also requires to be destroyed totally by the hospitals so that chances of spread of this virus could decrease. All district administrations were also coping up with the hospitals in destroying the waste completely from those hospitals.
She talked more about the disposal that said the hospitals which were not having incinerators like the private labs were made in contact with the outside companies which are being observed closely by the authorities to make sure the proper disposal of waste.
In spite of the fact that big hospitals in Pakistan have been incinerating bio-medical hospital waste, directions are aimed for make sure that the waste generated specifically during testing of people and treatment of covid-19 patients are discarded in a scientific way by using the set of rules given to these specific hospitals.
She told that it is dangerous because of infectious medical waste contains potentially dangerous microorganisms that can infect patients, hospital staff, and even the general public. Examples of infectious medical waste include body parts, blood and blood products, a patient’s bedding, or even a culture of an infectious agent.
Lately Pak-EPA has also directed the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) for proper dumping of Covid-19 waste.