Beach medical waste subject of investigation
(CNS) With an increase in blood and other medical waste turning up on local beaches, officials have finally begun a formal inquiry into where this is coming from. For months now, Plastic Free Cayman and other volunteers who regularly clean local beaches have been warning of an increase in vials of blood among the tonnes of garbage they collect. On Friday the Department of Health Regulatory Services (DHRS) said it was leading a multi-agency probe into the issue.
Officials said they had reached out to local registered healthcare facilities about the waste found on beaches in Grand Cayman, asking them to support the information gathering process to determine whether there is a local or international source of the waste.
Government’s forensics lab will be testing the contents of vials found on the beach to determine whether the source of the contents is animal or human, and the investigation, which has already started, will include the Sister Islands.
Government, itself, has been responsible for mismanaging medical waste. Three years ago it was dumped directly on the landfill in Cayman Brac after the Department of Environmental Health’s incinerator broke and was not replaced. On Grand Cayman, bio-waste piled up outside the George Town hospital in 2019 during the collection problems that plagued the DEH at the time, combined with a lack of proper skips.
Since then, reports of medical waste, which is a long-term problem, have increased and over the last few months the problem has become more acute.
“This waste poses a very serious public health concern and working group members are united in their desire to see to understand the origin of the hazardous items and resolve the issue as quickly as possible,” DHRS Director Mervyn Conolly said in a press release. “We are confident that the public share the same desire and urge anyone who comes across medical waste in a public area to treat it with utmost caution and separate it from other waste.”
Tourism sector workers and others who have found medical waste on any beaches in the past are being asked to report their findings. Under the current public health and litter laws, the DEH is the government agency with sole responsibility for the collection and sanitary disposal of medical waste generated here. The DEH falls under the health ministry.
The multi-agency working group includes representatives from the Ministry of Health, DHRS, Department of Environment, Department of Environmental Health, Royal Cayman Islands Police Service, Agriculture Department, Public Health Department, and the Health Practice Commission (HPC), which licenses local healthcare providers, including medical laboratories.
Conolly said the working group will report its findings to the health ministry, which called for the investigation, and to the public once it is complete.
For information about the safe and proper disposal of medical waste or to report finding blood and other bio waste on the beach call the Department of Environmental Health (DEH) customer service number, 949-6696.
Category: Environmental Health, Health, Medical Health
How can we investigate this and determine proof of anything when we don’t have something as basic as Radar to protect our borders. Yet this govt is spending copious amounts of money on political pet projects and cannot even keep our oceans safe and shoreline protected. This foolishness about investigations is just to placate our very little concern until it becomes a real problem.
Obviously not local…
Straight from Jamaica, Haiti and DR. Almost everything I find with a name on it is in Spanish. Probably can add PR to the list.
Seems like you don’t have any understanding of the directional current flow in the Caribbean sea. Hint, they also speak Spanish to the north, west, and south of Cayman.
The current is towards Central America. The stuff is not from Colombia.
Don’t worry Dwayne “The Brain” is on the case. Just like he solved health insurance for the unemployed. Dwayne wake up it’s February 2021.
The sea
For starters, Does Cayman have Medical Waste Management? Medical waste regulations? The year is 2021!
I won’t be surprised if next pandemic starts in Cayman. Thousands dead animals mixed with untreated medical waste from health care providers and pharmacies in hot and humid climate create perfect conditions for that.
By the way, where thousands vails from vaccination sites ended up? Can CNS or Compass or whomever find out? Or it is a secret stored in a safe with seven locks?
8 locks dufus
Yes there is an incinerator that burns ALL of caymans medical waste…
https://cnslocallife.com/2018/09/emissions-incinerators/
“While the DEH has provisions in place to monitor the construction and operation of incinerators, the official explained that the regulations do not include the “guidelines indicating what pollutants one should test for”. In addition, the DEH does not have the “necessary equipment to allow for adequate monitoring of such emissions at this time”.
As for when the DEH will be able to test for these emissions, “It is hoped that (the department) will be able to do so in the foreseeable future.”
Medical waste is hazardous waste and health care providers are responsible for proper disposal at designated location. It is not mixed with household and other waste.
2.35pm Have you seen the garbage trucks racing down the beaches?.
As for the investigation, if it’s anything like the CaymanTravel investigations into quarantine breakers, it will many months before we hear anything.
You know these islands is nothing e,se but critics a d rumor mongers both local and foreign residents.
Why doesn’t the Government implement a regulation requiring prescribed bins to be used for medical waste, these bins and bags can be color coded for the different types of medical waste. On collecting from hospitals etc the garbage trucks will then know that these colored bags are for the incinerator rather than general garbage at the facility. This is a simple and effective solution that doesn’t require too much thought of the politicians, hospital staff and administrators and yes garbage collectors.
Medical waste should not be collected by garbage trucks collecting household waste.
Medical waste is disposed of by first making it safe through a sterilization process. Waste that cannot be recycled, like gauze or needles, still needs to be made sanitary and non-hazardous before it can be disposed of. This process is usually done by using an autoclave.
Chupacabra
Given the bin men are incapable of closing bins, putting them back where they’ve found them, closing gates in strata areas, busy racing through Prospect streets to see who can finish first – I wouldn’t be surprised if their incompetence is the source.
Speaking of Prospect did you see they finally resurfaced Rosemary Street – 1 major problem, the retard$ have covered over all the drains down there. How dumb can you get?
As someone so devoted to criticizing others I doubt that you have much opportunity to think, but what you describe is standard practice. After a road is paved the manhole covers, drains, etc. will be a different height than the rest of the road so they have to be adjusted afterwards by whatever utility is responsible for them.
This way the paving gets done much faster, and there is a thing called GPS which enables the utility workers to find the exact location of those drains and manhole covers even after they have been paved over with asphalt. Isn’t that amazing?
Don’t forget to report back next week if they haven’t yet restored it to your satisfaction.
Excellent I hope you’re right! Assume they’ll eventually do the white lines and redo the old shabby speed bumps. Seems you’re the professional so hopefully you’ll know.
Why do you have to be such a rude person? It would be far more polite to nicely word what you wrote to this individual and educate them kindly.
Be nice Melania? But somehow you didn’t find it rude that someone living in a gated community would refer to the people who pickup his garbage and pave his roads as retard$?
Rosemary st. Hardly a gated community🤣🤣🤣
Be thankful we have garbage collection. The countries that trash comes from throw their waste into the gullies before it ends up on our beaches.
Seems the author of that post find very little to be thankful for. Shame.