Biomedical waste is a threat to global public environmental health and with plastic footprint becoming larger by the day due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, concerns on plastic waste choking the planet are mounting.
According to the Central Pollution Control Board, India has been generating nearly 146 tonnes of bio-medical waste everyday due to diagnostic activities and treatment of Covid-19 patients. Between June 2020 and May 10, 2021, India produced 45,308 tonnes of Covid-19 biomedical waste. This is in addition to the 615 tonnes of biomedical waste a day being produced before Covid-19, the pollution control board’s data showed.
This is an increase of almost 17% in biomedical waste generation solely because of the pandemic.
“There has been a general increase and since it is a crisis situation, we are not thinking of plastic but general prevention. The focus is no longer plastic, so that is a problem,” news agency PTI quoted Ravi Agarwal, founder-director of the environmental non-profit Toxics Link, saying.
-PTI
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