Biomedical waste could be India’s ticking bomb or a market

Almost 15,000 tonnes of medical waste go untreated every year in India—a potential biohazard crisis in the making. But with the right regulatory push, it could be serious business

India has a medical waste problem: hospitals, clinics and labs put out ever more each year, but treatment capacity is sluggish

On the one hand, there are enthusiastic startups that are struggling for government assistance to set up new treatment facilities

On the other hand there are large corporate players that are knocking door to door for household medical waste

With the number of treatment facilities remaining stagnant over the years how will we deal with burgeoning medical waste?

Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state and one of its poorest, hasn’t had the best track record in terms of medical facilities. Most infamously, 30 children died in the main government hospital in the district of Gorakhpur in 2017 due to a lack of oxygen cylinders. In January, the same hospital, Baba Raghav Das Medical College, was fined Rs 5 crore ($720,000) by the National Green Tribunal for improper disposal and burning of biomedical waste this January.

The problem of biomedical waste disposal isn’t new to Gorakhpur, nor limited to it.

AUTHOR

Suraksha P

Suraksha writes on Healthcare and Pharma. She has been a journalist for five years, reporting for The New Indian Express in Bengaluru and Chennai, and The Times of India, Delhi. In her previous stints she has written on health, civic issues and education. She investigated cover up of corruption in the state health department’s think tank, narrated harrowing tales of women who underwent unwarranted hysterectomies, and wrote about how loss of biometrics came in the way of Leprosy patients getting an Aadhaar card and thereby pension. She can be reached at suraksha at the-ken dot com.

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