The Impact of the Pandemic on the Surge of Medical Waste

While the COVID-19 pandemic has caused devastating loss of lives all around the world and disrupted our economics, businesses and livelihood, it has also presented a huge predicament to environmental health. Due to the high demand and immense use of single-use products such as masks, face shields, gloves, gowns and other personal protective equipment from both individual homes and healthcare facilities, the quantity of waste generated has increased dramatically. Aside from this, billions of vaccine doses have been administered across the world along with more than 100 million test kits. 

According to research by NCBI, approximately 16,649.48 tons of biomedical waste is generated per day. How did this specifically impact us?

When extra tons of waste are not properly managed, infected wastes could be dumped uncontrolled posing public health and spread of the corona various. The mobility restrictions and potential exposure to the virus have also been a challenge to our waste management sectors during the pandemic.

Most of the medical wastes are made of plastic and since these plastics are non- biodegradable, some can reach water bodies endangering wild and marine life. In countries like Hong Kong, face masks are found clogging waterways thereby affecting marine life.

Enforcement of proper waste management from every household and medical facility is critical during this pandemic to ensure environmental sustainability and public health. As such, there is an urgent global call from WHO to reform and reduce plastic packaging for medical devices. 

The recommendations also include investing and leaning on eco-friendly PPEs and packaging and non-burnable waste treatment facilities. The path towards addressing this environmental issue due to medical waste would be through strong national policies and regulations, workforce development and increased investment.