Facade of the AMCH incinerator. A Telegraph picture

Feb. 7: The same Pollution Control Board that advocates scientific disposal of hospital waste has inexplicably forced Assam Medical College and Hospital to shut down its incinerator.

The office of the AMCH superintendent, Dr Nripen Gogoi, today asked all private nursing homes and laboratories that had been sending biomedical waste to this facility to make their own arrangements. These nursing homes and laboratories were paying the AMCH a fee for using the incinerator.

Gogoi said the PCB had “some objections” to the incinerator being used, but did not specify what.

The AMCH generates around 35kg of biomedical waste everyday, all of which will henceforth be buried instead of being reduced to ashes. “We have opted for the deep burial process of disposing waste. Once a pit fills up, it will be sealed in a scientific manner,” the hospital superintendent said.

On what private nursing homes and laboratories should do, Dr Gogoi said the AMCH had informed them about the restriction imposed by the board and it was upto them to find a viable alternative.

The owner of a nursing home said the AMCH should have given them time before shutting down the incinerator. “Where do we go? The AMCH administration has put us in big trouble by issuing such an order without prior intimation.”

The PCB has been asking all private nursing homes and laboratories in Dibrugarh to have their own scientific garbage disposal system.

“Waste generated in hospitals is very dangerous and unscientific disposal could lead to serious health hazards. As we all know, Dibrugarh is a flood-prone area and carelessly dumped waste could trigger an epidemic during the monsoon,” said Basanta Goswami, a scientist at the Lahowal-based Regional Medical Research Centre of the Indian Council of Medical Research.