Waste management in institutional quarantine centres continues to be a challenge for the sanitation workers of the city Corporation, with the extra care involved in handling to prevent any kind of possible infections. The major kinds of waste generated at quarantine centres include food waste, large quantities of used water bottles and clothes, bedsheets and pillow covers.
According to the civic body's health officials, the workers have been given clear instructions on safe handling of waste.
“Before collecting the waste, they spray it with a disinfectant liquid consisting of Sodium hypochlorite and leave it as it is. It is collected only the next day or so. We have asked those staying in these quarantine centres to take with them the bedsheets and clothes provided by the Corporation. This would save us the work of destroying these safely. But many still leave these clothes behind,” says a health official.
The city Corporation had last month put in requests with the district administration for a laundry facility to wash the bedsheets and pillow covers left behind by those who have completed quarantine. With no such facility being available now, the clothes left behind are burned in the same premises. The other kinds of biodegradable waste are also disposed off in the premises of the respective institutional quarantine centres.
The sanitation workers who are involved in the routine sanitation works in public areas are also extra careful these days in handling waste, especially after the reports of sanitation workers testing COVID-19 positive in Thrissur recently.
“Since all of our work involves handling a variety of discarded material, we have to remain vigilant round-the-clock. As we use masks and gloves, we have some level of safety, but there is always the fear of infection,” said a sanitation worker, on condition of anonymity.
The Health Department had last week requested the Corporation for a list of health wing staff and sanitation workers to carry out COVID-19 tests as part of sentinel surveillance.
For the first phase of testing, the civic body had provided a list of 50 employees, including the health staff who were part of the burial of two persons who died due to COVID-19 in the district, those who are supervising institutional quarantine centres, sanitation workers and those who supply food to institutional quarantine centres. The samples are yet to be collected.
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