As if to prove the point made not more than an hour ago, about the inadequacy of waste storage arrangements in care and nursing homes, a news report from North Berwick where there is anger over placing of hospital waste bins. 

No concern for the visual amenity, or for waste security. This is totally unacceptable and contrary to so many good practice guidelines. Where is SEPA?

Mrs Pat Burton, chairman of the community council, said the bins, totalling around eight, which could hold clinical waste, were surrounded by “a nasty wooden fence.”

The chairman of the community council pointed out that “the waste bins were in the view of patients in the sitting room and dining room as well as those with rooms at the front of the hospital.  “It is insensitive and thoughtless,” claimed a spokesperson from The Friends of the Edington Hospital, who had spent a lot of money on the garden, providing seats for patients and visitors who would now have to look at the bins.”

The social role valorisation of the hospital residents has simply been ignored.

The Acting Director of Facilities, NHS Lothian, had said: “We have relocated waste bins to the front of the Edington Hospital for safety reasons and in response to recommendations made in the Traffic Management Health and Safety review 2010. “The safety of patients and staff is paramount and we have taken these steps to prevent large vehicles entering the site, thereby creating a safer environment. We are looking to further enhance the screening of the waste bins through the planting of flowers and other foliage.”

Well, that’s not an acceptable solution to waste security. Blaming health & safety has become passé in recent years and this is a prime example. Maybe large waste collection vehicles cannot maneuver through the grounds to collect from a store located in a more suitable location, in which case a smaller vehicle is required or the bins wheeled one to the vehicle. There aren’t that many!

And what about waste security? It is clear from HTM 07-01 that a secure waste compound is required for clinical wastes. A wooden fence is inadequate and “planting of flowers and other foliage” isn’t going to make that any better.

Sadly, this isn’t an uncommon occurrence and many NHS establishments and private nursing homes opt for the easy, and cheapest, option with no reference to the available guidance.

Is the guidance wrong? Or perhaps it’s the application of those guidelines that is at fault, with a corresponding failure in regulatory oversight? Either way, it’s not an acceptable situation.