No arrangements for disposal of households’ medical waste

TNN | Updated: Apr 8, 2020, 09:01 IST

Representative image

LUDHIANA: Even as most of the residents are wearing masks and gloves to check the spread of coronavirus, there is no arrangement for their disposal. With separate teams directed to collect masks and gloves from the houses of quarantined and infected people, residents say there should be a similar provision for rest of the houses too.
Municipal corporation commissioner KP Brar says, “We have deputed special teams, who have been provided protective gears, to collect masks and gloves of infected and quarantined people. At other houses, residents are not segregating medical waste.”
Residents say the authorities should strictly follow norms to handle this waste across the city.
A resident of Model Town, Harpreet Singh, says, “Almost every person is using masks and gloves, but there are no guidelines for their disposal. Not many of them are aware that these should be discarded in yellow bags or bins. This unawareness is leading to no separation of medical waste and they being dumped in the open.”
Shruti Puri, a resident of Maya Nagar, says, “With Covid-19 cases increasing, the civic body should be more careful in handling the waste. People should be told to dispose of gloves and masks separately.”
A garbage collector says, “We are at risk when we go for garbage collection, as residents are not segregating waste. And if a person is infected, we can also contract the virus while separating his waste. The authorities are hardly bothered about our health.”