Department investigates medical waste spills in Evander
The Evander Hospital is in the hot seat.
The Evander Hospital could face criminal charges if its staff are found guilty of disposing of medical waste in an unlawful manner.
This comes after residents living on Raymond Mhlaba Street in Evander, near the hospital, complained that they found body parts, a foetus and blood streaming out of the manholes in their yards and the streets.
The Ridge Times reported on this issue, which started in 2018, in its April 7 edition and asked the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment for comment.
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Albi Modise, the spokesperson for the department, said Evander Hospital was issued a compliance notice in terms of S31L of the National Environment Management Act, and the instructions required them to implement measures to ensure that healthcare risk waste generated by the hospital did not enter the sewer system.
According to the notice, the hospital must also ensure that all its operational managers and staff follow the correct procedures when dealing with this waste.
They must provide a long-term plan that caters for the regular removal of the waste, and a constructive solution to ensure any effluent from the hospital does not migrate into the environment.
Modise said that at the end of last year, they noticed that parts of the compliance notice, which deal with implementing constructive solutions, were not fully addressed.
He further said a failure to comply with the notice is an offence, as contemplated by Section 49A(1)(k) of the National Environmental Management Act 107 of 1998 and that this conduct, together with the environmental pollution, forms part of a recently initiated criminal investigation.
“Once the investigation is finalised, the criminal docket will be submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions for a decision on whether or not to proceed with a prosecution, and if so, against which parties.”
