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Review
. 2022 Aug 1:832:155072.
doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155072. Epub 2022 Apr 7.

Overcoming challenges due to enhanced biomedical waste generation during COVID-19 pandemic

Priti Chhanda Ojha  1 , Swati Sucharita Satpathy  2 , Akash Kumar Ojha  3 , Lala Behari Sukla  2 , Debabrata Pradhan  4
Affiliations
Review

Overcoming challenges due to enhanced biomedical waste generation during COVID-19 pandemic

Priti Chhanda Ojha et al. Sci Total Environ. .

Abstract

Biomedical wastes (BMWs) are potentially infectious to the environment and health. They are co-dependent and accumulative during the ongoing coronavirus disease-2019(COVID-19) pandemic. In India the standard treatment processes of BMWs are incineration, autoclaving, shredding, and deep burial; however, incineration and autoclaving are the leading techniques applied by many treatment providers. These conventional treatment methods have several drawbacks in terms of energy, cost, and emission. But the actual problem for the treatment providers is the huge and non-uniform flow of the BMWs during the pandemic. The existing treatment methods are lacking flexibility for the non-uniform flow. The Government of India has provisionally approved some new techniques like plasma pyrolysis, sharp/needle blaster, and PIWS-3000 technologies on a trial basis. But they are all found to be inadequate in the pandemic. Therefore, there is an absolute requirement to micromanage the BMWs based on certain parameters for the possible COVID-19 like pandemic in the future. Segregation is a major step of the BMW management. Its guideline may be shuffled as segregation at the entry points followed by collection instead of the existing system of the collection followed by segregation. Other steps like transportation, location of treatment facilities, upgradation of the existing treatment facilities, and new technologies can solve the challenges up to a certain extent. Technologies like microwave treatment, alkaline hydrolysis, steam sterilization, biological treatment, catalytic solar disinfection, and nanotechnology have a lot of scopes for the treatment of BMWs. Hi-tech approaches in handling and transportation are found to be fruitful in the initial steps of BMW management. End products of the treated BMWs can be potentially fabricated for the application in the built environment. Some policies need to be re-evaluated by the health care facilities or government administrations for efficient BMW management.

Keywords: Biomedical wastes; COVID-19 pandemic; Policies; Treatment facilities; Upgrading conventional techniques.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Unlabelled Image
Graphical abstract
Fig. 1
Fig. 1
BMW generated and treated in India from the year 2007 to 2019 in terms of tons per day(TPD). *Data is collected from CPCB website, 2022.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Percentage of BMW treated in India from the year 2007 to 2019. *Data is collected from CPCB website, 2022.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
COVID-19 related BMWs generated in India during pandemic in terms of tons per day(TPD). *Data is collected from CPCB website, 2022.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Liquid BMW treatment procedure (Kaushal et al., 2022).
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Schematic conventional techniques used for BMW Management.
Fig. 6
Fig. 6
Possible aspects of BMW management for overcoming challenges due to COVID-19 like pandemic in the future.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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