Introduction

According to Biomedical Handling Rules 1998, liquid pathological and chemical waste should be appropriately treated before discharge into sewer. Pathological waste should be first treated with disinfectants, neutralized and then flushed into sewage system. The treated effluent should conform to the following limits:

These limits are in conformation with the Environment Protection Act, 1986. The Section 3 of this act states that “For the purpose of protecting and improving the quality of the environment and preventing and abating the environmental pollution, the standards for emission or discharge of environmental pollutants from industries, operations or processes shall be specified in Schedule I or IV.”

Minimal Safety Requirements

Where the medical establishments cannot afford the treatment of biomedical liquid waste the following measures should be undertaken to reduce the risks:

1. Patients with enteric diseases should be isolated to wards where their excreta can be collected in buckets for chemical disinfection .This is of utmost importance in case of cholera outbreak.
2. No chemicals or pharmaceuticals should be discharged into sewer.
3. Sludge from hospital cesspools should be dehydrated on natural drying beds and disinfected chemically with 1 % sodium hypochlorite solution.
4. Sewage from these establishments should never be used for agricultural, aquaculture or recreational purposes.

The liquid biomedical waste can be treated using effluent treatment plant.