Over 100 hospitals sharing waste data with EPA: Farzana Altaf Shah.

ISLAMABAD -- Director General Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Farzana Altaf Shah Thursday said over 100 hospitals in the federal capital were sharing their waste management data with the Agency.

The DG-EPA told reporter that under the Hospital Waste Management rules 2005, all the public and private hospitals in the federal capital were bound to comply with the law and safely manage their waste management and disposal.

She said, 'We have shared the data with the Prime Minister as well, however the EPA teams are regularly conducting visits to all the health care institutes in the federal capital. We are also trying to bring local private clinics and hospitals in the net that are operating in the rural and far off areas. Hazardous waste of these institutes is detrimental for human health and environment which is necessarily to be managed safely.'

Initially, she said during the monitoring visits of the teams issues like mismanaged combustion temperature of incinerators at various hospitals, absence of incinerator, outsource of hospital waste collection to unauthorized garbage collectors and absence of any cogent mechanism were observed.

'EPA has sealed numerous hospitals in the federal capital that have been found violating the hospital waste management law,' the DG-EPA said.

To a question, she said the record unhealthy ambient air in the federal capital was mainly due to abrupt weather pattern creating dust storms and increased vehicular emissions.

She argued that there had been...