TABUK CITY, Kalinga – This was the findings of two separate waste management monitoring inspections conducted by the City Environment and Natural Resources Office (CENRO) and the Department of Health (DOH).
In its report during the Ecological Solid Waste Management Board (ESWMB) meeting on May 24, the CENRO stated that not one of the 19 health care facilities in the city have obtained environmental management certificates (ECCs) and three do not have existing health care waste management programs.
Eight of the facilities also do not properly segregate their wastes in plastic liners and all of them do not use color-coded plastic liners for the different types of wastes.
The CENRO also found that there was presence of spillage during the collection and transport of wastes by 18 of the health care facilities.
Most of the facilities are not also complying with the specifications for the required concrete septic vault for the disposal of hazardous and infectious hospital wastes.
Sixteen have septic vaults within 150 meters of water supply sources and/or dwellings units which is a violation, 16 do not have the minimum dimension of 1 meter x 1 meter x 1.8 meter depth, 16 do not have concrete walls and slabs, all do not have the required safety boxes for sharps and needles in the septic vaults and do not have security fences and signages.
Regarding the management of waste water, 15 do not have staff trained in proper healthcare waste management, 16 also do not conduct regular testing of their effluents and three do not practice infection control protocols.
On the other hand, the DOH which conducted the inspection through Sanitary Engineer Smith Dawaton of the City Health Office reported to the ESWMB during the meeting that only two of the eight so far monitored is fully compliant with proper waste management disposal.
The DOH gave five of the eight facilities one week to construct the required septic vault.
Licensing Officer Braille Cawis said that more or less, their findings are similar to those of the CENRO.
ESWMB NGO representative Sison Paut commented that the findings are alarming even as he called on the DOH Permit and Licensing Office not to renew the licences of the non-compliant health care facilities to make them follow regulations.
Paut said that “the law is the law” and that all health care facilities in the city should be compelled to abide.
The monitoring activities were in line with the resolution passed by the ESWMB during its meeting on February 8 requesting the DOH and the Environment Management Bureau (EMB) to strictly monitor the disposal of hazardous wastes by local hospitals and clinics.
The resolution was prompted by the report from CENRO personnel that after the practice of some health care establishments in the city of dumping their hazardous wastes in the city dump site at barangay Dilag was stopped through the non-collection of such wastes by garbage collectors and the checking of wastes being brought to the facility, hazardous wastes started to appear on roadsides and in illegal dump sites in the city.
During the meeting on May 24, the body tasked the DOH, DENR and CENRO to continue conducting periodic monitoring of the health care facilities this time utilizing a simpler monitoring tool which they will devise.
The CENRO reported during the meeting that the 10-year Solid Waste Management Plan of the city was approved by the National Solid Waste Management Commission April 25, 2017 through Resolution No. 908, series of 2017.**Estanislao Albano, Jr.
