A health and safety expert has criticised Cheshire West and Chester Council (CWaC) for failing to provide a clinical waste collection service.
Tony Whittaker, of Artillery Road, Saighton, said the issue came to light while caring for his elderly father, who sadly passed away recently.
[I wonder, does Mr Whittaker have a conflict of interest here, as well as, perhaps, a lack of objectivity?]
People across the borough are left with little option but to put bodily waste and contaminated material in the household rubbish bins, he said.
This is in stark contrast to neighbouring Flintshire Council which offers a special collection service.
Mr Whittaker, who worked as a health and safety environmental manager for 15 years, said: “I know the workmen who work with this material. They have to open the bags to see if there are any recyclable goods and often they find clinical waste.
“It’s a health and safety risk for them. The lads say they often refuse to take it off the line. This stuff should be going for incineration.”
He added: “I just think it’s wrong. The council are so blasé about it.”
Mr Whittaker, 58, said the solution would be to have a “policy and procedure in place” for dealing with clinical waste.
“When someone has to have home care they should register with the district nurses who can then contact the council asking for a special bin,” he said.
“They would then arrange for this to be collected once a week, or once every two weeks, for example.”
A spokesman for CWaC said: “Cheshire West and Chester Council do not carry out a clinical waste collection service.
“We advise that you contact your local GP or practice nurse to make such arrangements. Additional domestic capacity can be provided to residents who produce medical waste that does not include sharps or contain blood products.
“Waste generated by a health care worker at the house is their waste and not household waste.”
In contrast, Flintshire Council’s website states: “We will provide a free collection of clinical household waste from your house and provide you with a suitable container to store your clinical waste.
So, the Council make clear that there is a service, to be arranged by the GPs in the area when a clinical necessity arises. This is, most likely, funded by the relevant Clinical Commissioning Group.
We don’t know how much or what type of clinical wastes were being produced. However, there is nothing wrong with small volumes of non-pharma, non-sharps waste deep within more general wastes within a black sack.
it’s hardly enough to go to the local papers, complaining about this.