Contaminated hospital waste is piling up in the Italian epicentre of the coronavirus crisis. Medics at the Cremona hospital in the Mediterranean country’s north say the surge in patients since March has made the issue of its safe disposal particularly sensitive. Staff must be trained to properly handle everything from sheets and masks to syringes—standard hospital items now laced with added danger in a pandemic caused by a new and still unexplored disease.
Medics at the Cremona hospital in the Mediterranean country’s north say the surge in patients since March has made the issue of its safe disposal particularly sensitive. Staff must be trained to properly handle everything from sheets and masks to syringes—standard hospital items now laced with added danger in a pandemic caused by a new and still unexplored disease. The waste is now sealed in plastic bags and stored in a separate room to avoid airborne particles from spreading across hospital halls. The bags are then boxed and hermetically sealed, their contents labeled on the outside. The boxes are eventually packed onto carts and sent for removal in sealed metal containers.
The entire operation is performed by covered-up teams who take their jobs extremely seriously. “We have trained disposal teams to wear all the protective equipment. They do not face any added risk,” hospital medical director Lorenzo Cammelli said. “The transport officials find the containers already sealed. There is no additional risk for them either.”
Source: Phys.org
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