Roseline Mutare
MASVINGO CITY-MASVINGO PROVINCIAL Hospital’s incinerator has not been working for years, posing a serious health hazard for the patients and the surrounding community.
When The Midweek Watch crew visited the only referral hospital in Masvingo Province on Tuesday, the situation was dire as piles and piles of medical waste were strewn on the roadside just outside the malfunctioning incinerator.
A City of Masvingo Health Department Vehicle was filmed disposing of medical waste in the road and vultures could be seen circulating in the sky waiting for an opportunity to grab something.
The medical waste include limbs, placentas and human body parts removed during operations and very soon dogs and cats will be regular visitors at the facility.
Some wild birds are said to be in the habit of dropping whatever they would have taken from the heap and drop the left overs on Rhodene houses’ rooftops.
This situation has been exacerbated by the recent collapse of the incinerator’s chimney, which gave in due to heavy rains that have pounded the region over the past months when they tried to renovate the facility.
Dr. Noel Zulu, the hospital’s medical superintendent, confirmed the incinerator’s prolonged inoperability, citing air pollution as a significant concern.
“The incinerator has not been working for years, and we are now facing the consequences, renovation efforts are underway, with the project at 80% complete and expected to be finished within a week,” said Zulu.
However, the hospital’s struggles with medical waste disposal predate the incinerator’s breakdown. The city council’s offer to provide land for waste disposal in Mucheke has been hindered by the challenges posed by heavy rains, which have rendered the terrain inaccessible to heavy trucks.
“We are between a rock and a hard place, we cannot transport the waste to Mucheke due to the rain-soaked terrain, and we cannot dispose of it properly until the incinerator is fixed, all we can do is wait,” Dr Zulu lamented.
Since the incinerator stopped working some years back the hospital has been taking the medical waste to a city council dumpsite in Runyararo West for burning and that has since stopped as the place is no longer accessible to to water logging.
The implications of this situation are far-reaching and alarming. The accumulation of hazardous medical waste poses significant risks to public health, environmental safety, and the well-being of hospital staff and patients.
