Winter clinical waste collections

More from the Local Authorities concerning clinical waste collections in this harsh winter weather.

West Lancashire Borough Council have announced that from 23 December until at least Tuesday 28 December at the earliest, clinical waste collections have been suspended as a result of the continuing severe weather.

 “If weather permits, clinical waste collections will resume from Tuesday 28 December and clinical waste customers are asked to put out their waste on their usual collection day during that week. (Homes which normally have a Monday collection will have a Tuesday collection).

 “During the week beginning 28 December, the collectors will deliver a double set of sacks and containers. Extra waste will be collected the following week. Clinical waste customers are asked to ensure they use only the correct sacks and containers to present their waste.

If the severe weather continues there may be further disruption. Residents are asked to be patient if ice or snow does cause more disruption. Further updates on 4 January 2011.

A practical solution perhaps, and well done for publicising the information so well though a phone call to each domestic producer might help since some of these patients may not have access to the internet and those who do may not choose to look at the Council website.

Leaving aside the matter of communication, the issue of double sacks at teh next collecton date, whenever that may be raises another issue. What to do with wastes in the meantime? This becomes especially important considering the warning “Clinical waste customers are asked to ensure they use only the correct sacks and containers to present their waste“.

What happens in the meantime? Where does the waste go? And wherever that is, do we really expect patients to then transfer those wastes back into a yellow or orange sack, that may not arrive for 1 or 2 weeks, or even longer? And what about all those sharps?

This spell of severe weather might act as a reminder to collection authorities to rethink the policy of issuing a minimum number of waste containers, sacks and bins, and replacing those only on a 1-for-1 basis. As winter approaches, these could be supplemented with a few additional containers and an instruction notice to hold these in reserve for use when routine weekly collections are delayed or suspended. In the spring, when the danger of disruption due to weather has passed issue of waste containers might be re-balanced – ideally with a knock on the door or information disseminated though the support services, home care assistants, carers networks and community nursing services, to make sure that those spare containers are still available are put into use.

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