Wednesday, 6 April 2022

Waste and recycling management

Ms CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (17:36): (1872) My adjournment matter this evening is for the Minister for Health, and it is in relation to the clinical waste being generated at hospitals, vaccination hubs, clinics and other health outlets as a result of the COVID crisis and the generation of PPE and the like. Victoria is currently generating clinical waste rapidly and in large volumes. Major clinical waste disposal companies have raised concerns regarding the backlog of this waste, describing the sheer volume being dealt with as overwhelming and unmanageable. I have been contacted by several people, but in particular people working in the industry have said just how unmanageable it is becoming.

Multiple issues are attributed to this backlog, which is creating an increasing public health and safety risk in our communities. Firstly, as this waste must be incinerated the incinerator machines require extensive maintenance, which is not a current priority. Due to the lack of maintenance, clinical waste is then remaining in the disposal trucks at the depots, creating a backlog as many of the incinerators are not functioning. As a flow-on effect, this is leading to waste building up at the depots, and it is now spilling over at these depots, causing substantial health and safety risks, as I said, not only in the local vicinity but more broadly. The issue is getting more critical each day as waste from hospitals, vaccination sites and other clinical areas is not being appropriately managed and disposed of.

Action must be immediately taken to fix this disposal system, as it is just building up each and every day, putting the health of Victorians at risk and also creating this massive backlog of medical waste lingering in these depots. The Environment Protection Authority Victoria has been contacted and is involved in resolving the issue, I understand, but there are requests from those working in these industries, saying, ‘We need more immediate action’. So the action I am seeking is that the Minister for Health, not the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change, provide to the house the exact details of the plan to fix this exacerbating clinical waste issue in Victoria.