Biomedical Waste in Indian Context

Hospitals generate waste which is chemically hazardous, infectious and often radioactive. Such waste because of inappropriate disposal/treatment strategies contributes to serious health hazards in the community. The main concern of infectious hospital waste is the transmission of HIV and infectious hepatitis viruses. As regulatory measures, the Bureau of Indian Standards, New Delhi has issued guidelines for the management of Solid Wastes-Hospitals 1989. The Ministry of Environment and Forests has also issued rules on the categorization of biomedical waste in 1997-98. The implementation of the above could mitigate the ill effects of the exponentially increasing problem of biomedical waste in India