In a meeting held last week, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has asked all the general practitioner's of the city to register themselves in the biomedical waste collection and disposal facility by September 15. Though the bio medical waste rules had come out in 2011, the PMC has failed to register all doctors of the city. Anvi Mehta speaks to Sunil Paigude, President of General Practitioner's Association (GPA), Pune asking the reaction of practitioner in the city.
Q: What is the biomedical waste generated in a general practitioners clinic?
A. A general practitioners clinic, bio medical waste will comprise of scrubs, masks, chemicals, stool and blood samples, laboratory waste, catheters and tubes.
Q:What were the main grievances the doctors had?
A. General practitioner either has a clinic or a small nursing homes, in both the cases the amount of bio medical waste cannot go more than 1 or 2 kilograms a day. But the subscription rates of the corporation's biomedical waste disposal facility and the per kilo gram treatment rates were high. After the meet the rates have now been slashed from Rs2900 per year to 2100 per year. Also there was no door to door collection service of waste regularly, the doctors cannot store the waste for long periods of time
Q Will the price slashing help increasing registrations?
The slashing down of prices is according to what doctors wanted, but the problem if that in the past two years only 2000 practitioners have registered themselves. There are 5000 -6000 general practitioners in the city. For the past three years, 60 per cent of them have been violating the bio medical waste management rules and have remained unnoticed. The price slashing should help to get more registrations, but that will not be enough. The PMC must prepare a list of general practitioners and approach all of them. For that purpose, the GPA will help them too.
Q Are there any other complaints or demands of general practitioners?
A The price slashing was one major demand which has been fulfilled by the corporation. Apart from that, doctors want a door to door service for waste collection. We have asked the corporation officials to divide the clinics as per areas and make the government hospital of that area as the collection center. If every day door to door is not possible, at least a near by collection center will help the doctors to give away their waste themselves at the center. We are also in talk with the officials to cancel all the previous notices sent every three months to registered practitioners and start a fresh registration this year.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}