Managing Medical Wastes During the Covid-19 Pandemic in Nigeria

Michael Ugom

Abstract

A pandemic disease poses great threats to humans and apparently, leading to a global crisis and challenge on the health, economic and other sectors of human endeavour. In order to minimize the devastating effects from pandemics such as the novel corona virus, effective management of ever increasing medical waste is pertinent. Recently, Nigeria has been reporting increasing number of cases from Covid-19 with increasing pressure mounted on the Government, healthcare systems and the populace in entirety. Owing to the high rate of infection from the corona virus, a more sophisticated method of managing the generated infectious is pertinent to mitigate the effects of the infectious medical waste accruing to the environment. More emphasis in the spread and management of covid-19 in Nigeria is focused on establishing testing centres, treatment centres and isolation facilities with little attention or no attention towards establishment of a safe disposal facilities for the infectious waste generated. This study has assessed effective management strategies for covid-19 associated medical wastes in Nigeria. Data for the study was majorly descriptive and adapted from secondary source through the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC). Investigations from the study carried out reveals that Nigeria's foremost Environmental Regulatory body has no officially assigned dumpsite across the country for medical waste. Furthermore, the tertiary healthcare facilities across Nigeria's states has no safe and proper facilities for disposal of infectious medical waste. Challenges such as the various lackadaisical attitude and negligence of the populace towards covid-19 pandemic as well as poor enforcement of guidelines on infectious medical waste. In addition, the study recommends based on the findings, the use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) by waste collectors and the involvement of relevant stakeholders in the creation of environmental department to be supervised by Environmental Health Officers in all hospitals as a measure to ensure effective enforcement of the guidelines on safe disposal of infectious medical waste.