CHARMINAR: Osmania
General Hospital
(OGH), the biggest public sector hospital in Telangana, has been polluting Musi with drug resistant bacteria.
A fact-finding team of Human Rights Forum (HRF) that visited the hospital expressed concern that the authorities have been violating bio-medical waste (management and handling) rules, 2016, by dumping hospital waste in the open.
Musi, which is a tributary of the river Krishna, plays a key role in stabilising the
Krishna delta, which is considered the rice bowl of Andhra Pradesh. One of the factors for the emergence of drug-resistant bacteria in Musi is unscientific dumping of animal waste there.
The team noticed many plastic bags containing human anatomical waste kept in the open outside the room meant for bio-hazardous waste. HRF leader and senior scientist
Dr K Babu Rao
, who was a part of the fact-finding team, told TOI that several practices ban ned under bio-medical waste (management and handling) rules, 2016, were followed by hospital authorities.
“Bio-medical waste (management and handling) rules prescribe handling biomedical waste on the premises of generation. Human anatomical waste is categorized in Schedule 1. It is the duty of the hospital authorities to take steps to ensure that bio-medical waste is handled without any adverse effect to human health and environment,“ he said. Dr Babu Rao said that unsafe open space storage is a violation of the bio-medical waste (management and handling) rules.
He said that the team noticed two bundles of postmortem linen on the side of the road leading to the mortuary . Quoting WHO guidelines, Dr Babu Rao said that soiled linen should be placed in clearly-labelled, leakproof bags or buckets at the site of use.
“We saw a choked drain adjacent to the old mortua ry , presently used as storage for unclaimed bodies. The bodies are in various stages of decomposition producing liquid discharges that enter the open drain outside the building. We also saw blood and body fats in the drain,“ he said, adding that it's the duty of authorities concerned to treat waste before letting it into the drain.
The team found that the building housing the mortuary was discharging waste generated directly into sewers, that include blood.
Syed Akbar is a senior journalist from Hyderabad. He is a special...
Read MoreSyed Akbar is a senior journalist from Hyderabad. He is a specialist-journalist in science, technology, health, politics, environment, development, wildlife, religion, communities, and consumer affairs. He has been in the profession for the last 24 years. Before joining The Times of India, he worked with Deccan Chronicle and Indian Express.
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