According to Technopak consultancy report, India’s healthcare industry reaches at USD 50 billion at present and is expected to double to USD 100 billion by 2015. It means that India needs another 2.8 million beds to match the global average of 3 beds per 1000 population from the present level of 0.7 beds per 1000 population.
At present, India produces biomedical waste of around 1-2 kg per day per bed and generates 0.33 million tons of biomedical waste annually. With increase in population and health services, ratio per bed per 1000 will increase, resulting in increase of bio-medical waste.
Looking at the present growth, it will increase by three fold; therefore there will be a great pressure on biomedical waste management service providers in the future. Much more work is required to be done in this field. In coming days, scientists and planners will have to devote much time and energy to establish workable and safe healthcare waste management (HCWM) systems in all hospitals, nursing homes, blood banks, dental clinics, laboratories, etc. in urban and semi-urban areas, as well as plan strategy for HCWM in rural area. In fact, with immunisation programmes and outreach of HIV/AIDS Voluntary Counseling and Testing Centres (VCTCs) to the Community Health Centres (CHCs) and eventually to Primary Health Centres (PHCs) all over the country, the HCWM in rural sector will have to be in the core of waste management planning, in the coming days.
