TABUK CITY, Kalinga – Operation of the city’s hazardous wastes storage facility is awaiting the issuance of permit by the Environment Management Bureau-Cordillera.
The facility constructed at the city public landfill site in Barangay Dilag is seen to address the pressing need for a disposal facility for hazardous wastes coming from hospitals, clinics, rural health units, and funeral homes.
City Environment and Natural Resources Officer Salud I. Lammawin said the facility is crucial amid the increasing number of health care facilities that opened in Tabuk.
She cited hospital wastes handling, disposal, and transport as primary concerns.
As in-house storage, hospitals and similar facilities should provide their own septic vaults, Lammawin said.
Hospitals in the city avail of the services of a contract wastes transporter from outside the province in the disposal of their wastes.
Provincial Environmental Management Unit Officer Aubrey Agyao said health care facilities should put up a waste management system, considering that wastes from its operation are highly toxic and hazardous. Agyao also cited the need for a pollution control unit in these facilities. – Larry Lopez
