Syringes, needles, catheters, tubes to take samples… hospital wastesome with traces of blood, stand out in a mountain of trash that flows into the sea after crossing the highly polluted river that crosses Caracas.
They are scattered on the sand among a stinking carpet of plastic containers.
The mouth opens on the beach of Paparo, a town with about 3,000 inhabitants in the state of Miranda (central-north), about 130 km from Caracas. A small mangrove tree tries to make its way through the debris. Others have died after not being able to overcome the thick layer of plastic that suffocates the sand.
“To keep the beach clean is to love it”it reads on an old metal fence.
But there the waters of the Tuy river arrive, which receives the polluted currents of the Guaire, a flow of sewage that crosses the capital of Venezuela.
Hospital waste, whose handling must be governed by strict protocols that include its separation into containers according to its degree of risk, are not new to this beach where needles stick out of the sand.
They reach the sea within “mineral water carafes” full of these discarded supplies, says Héctor Manuel Blanco, who at 61 years old walks through the carpet of waste in search of pieces of bamboo to sell.
Inside these containers are “hose, needles, syringes”Follow White. AND “The little boys (children) begin to break those pots to get that out, they take out the needles” to play.
“Potential for infection”
The needles for example, “considered the most dangerous category of healthcare waste (…) due to the risk of needlestick injuries, which carry a high potential for infection,” according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Venezuela’s public health system has collapsed for decades. Many incinerators do not work or do so only half way, in addition to the lack of policies for the classification and management of waste in general aggravates the situation.
Although few volunteers have collected some hospital materials on the coast, says Luisa Escobar, head of the NGO Fudena, which has been collecting and classifying waste on beaches for more than 30 years.
In October 2022, for example, they found hospital waste, including surgical blades, inside a plastic soda bottle on a key in the paradisiacal Morrocoy National Park (Falcón, northwest).
The NGO Doctors Without Borders (MSF) promotes a program for the management of this waste.
In a hospital in Puerto Ayacucho (Amazon, south) “We have installed a high-powered incinerator to support the management of medical waste that is produced in the hospital and in the urban health centers located around the city”explained Héctor Blanco, supervisor of MSF Water and Sanitation in the state.
“We see a willingness to strengthen the processes and systems necessary for safe management of medical waste.”
Unfulfilled promise
The Guaire is the main drainage route for wastewater in Caracas and for more than a century it has been contaminated, but even more so since the beginning of the 21st century.
The late former president Hugo Chávez (1998-2013) even promised to clean it up in 2005, but it never materialized.
Meanwhile, in Paparo garbage accumulates, which increases in the rainy season.
Locals fish near the debris, while flocks of seabirds search for prey amid the chaos.
“This garbage is coming down from Caracas” forming “a plastic bed,” says Luis Hernández, a 53-year-old fisherman. “Before it was beautiful, clean, with coconut trees everywhere”the Mint.
Source: AFP
Source: Gestion
Ricardo is a renowned author and journalist, known for his exceptional writing on top-news stories. He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he is known for his ability to deliver breaking news and insightful analysis on the most pressing issues of the day.
