The Tribune, Chandigarh, India - Chandigarh Stories

HEALTH

DISPOSAL OF BIO-MEDICAL WASTE
Hospitals violating SC order to face action
Monica Sharma

Chandigarh, January 29
Less than a month after the expiry of the deadline set by the Supreme Court for ensuring the proper disposal of bio-medical waste, the UT Pollution Control Committee has decided to come down heavily on nursing homes and hospitals, not complying with the directions.

The committee has decided to carry out raids for checking violations and enforcing the directions in both government and private medical institutes. Special teams are being constituted for the purpose. The members are expected to “get down to serious business with in next few days”.

“The inspections are on, but we are not being harsh, not at this stage at least,” says Consultant-cum-Chandigarh’s former Director, Health Services, Dr Rameshwar Chander. “We are still trying to motivate and educate them”.

The decision to act against the violators is significant as there are 400 private nursing homes in the city, along with 45 dispensaries and five hospitals, besides 500 set-ups associated with the National Indian System of Medicine. Except for the hospitals, about 80 per cent of the institutes are yet to comply with the directions, as per the officials.

They say 1 kg of garbage is generated per bed, out of which about 250 to 300 grams is bio-medical waste which has to be disposed of in a proper manner.

The apex court, as per the officials, had earlier ordered that all government and private hospitals were required to make proper arrangements for the disposal of the bio-medical waste by December last year. Failure to comply with the orders can lead to prosecution.

Giving details of the requirements, officials claim that all clinics and medical laboratories examining 1000 patients or more every month are also required to get authorisation from the committee.

Institutes examining less than 1000 cases per month are not supposed to seek authorisation, but it is essential for them to manage their waste as per the norms laid down in the Act, officials assert.

They said bio-medical waste, including human tissues, organs, blood, soiled dressings and cultures are required to be incinerated. Plastic material like syringes and tubes are to be first disinfected by chemicals and then shredded. Rest of domestic refuse, they insist, has to be disposed in the municipal bins.

The garbage has to be segregated at the point of generation, the officials reveal. The incinerated material has to go to the yellow bin, shredded plastic material to the blue bin, while municipal garbage has to be kept in a black or a white bin.

Regarding the existing facilities for waste disposal, Dr Rameshwar Chander says that arrangements for proper disposal of waste have been made at Sector 16 General Hospital, besides Sector 32 Government Medical College and Hospital. The same has been ensured at the PGI also, the doctor adds.

He further adds that all nursing homes are attached to the India Waste Energy Development Private Limited and the Alliance Bio-Medical Waste Management Company.

These companies, he reveals, are collecting the waste and transporting it to the PGI for incineration, but shredding is being carried out at shredders of the companies concerned.

Multi-specialty health camp by Fortis
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 29
Fortis Heart Institute & Multi-Specialty Hospital will hold a free multi-specialty health check-up camp in association with Dr RS Parmar and Rotary Roopnagar. The camp will provide people on opportunity to get free consultation from some of India’s leading specialists in cardiology, endocrinology, pulmonology, ENT, ophthalmology, psychiatry, nephrology and general medicine. This camp will be held at Parmar Hospital, Bela Road, Roopnagar, from 9.30 am to 4 pm on January 31.

Renowned doctors from Fortis, Dr Sudheer Saxena, Consultant, Interventional Cardiology, Dr KP Singh, Consultant, Endocrinology, Dr Amandeep Singh Gill, Consultant. Pulmonology, Dr Hardeep Singh, Consultant, Psychiatry, Dr GD Rattan, Consultant, ENT Dr Arvind Sharma, Consultant, Ophthalmology etc will be present at the camp in addition to other doctors from Fortis.

During the camp the people will be provided with free consultation and on-the-spot free tests like ECG, blood sugar and blood grouping.

SPORTS

UT ball badminton teams
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, January 29
Anisha Bhatti and Shiv Kumar will lead Chandigarh’s women and men team during the 48th Senior National Ball Badminton championship to be held in Bhopal from February 1 to 5. According to Mr Baljinder Singh, general secretary, Chandigarh Ball Badminton Association, the teams are: Women: Anisha Bhatti, Sonika, Monika Panjla, Shweta Vyas, Navdeep, Jaswinder Kaur, Talwinder Kaur and Amita.

Men: Shiv Kumar, Jatinder Singh, Gurwinder Singh, Pardeep Singh, Manmeet, Neeraj, Ashok and Parveen.

PATIALA

Cross-country race

Gurjant Singh of Hostel No 5 won the Punjabi University campus inter-hostel cross country race in the men’s section, which was held on the campus here today.

Mr R.N. Pal, Pro-Vice Chancellor, inaugurated the competition, which was organised by the Department of Physical Education and Sports of Punjabi University. Dr Bhupinder Singh, Joint Director (sports), welcomed the chief guest. Other results: Men: Gurjant Singh (Hostel No. 5)- first, Sukhwinder Singh (Hostel No. 6)- second, Ranjit Singh (Hostel No. 5)-third. (women): Ranbir Sekhon (Hostel No. 2)- first, Neelam (Hostel No.7)- second, Sarabjit Kaur (Hostel No.2)-third.

Punjab reach semifinal

Punjab beat Mumbai by 121 runs to enter the semi-finals of the All-India Indoor Cricket Tournament played at the Budha Dal sports complex here today.

In other quarter-final matches, Punjab (hosts) got the better of Maharashtra by 22 runs, Haryana downed Uttranchal by 52 runs, while Uttar Pradesh beat past Chandigarh by 11 runs.

The tourney is being organised by Pepsu Veteran’s Cricket Club, Patiala. Prominent among those present at the opening ceremony were Mr Mohinder Singh Khasa, secretary of the All India Indoor Cricket Association, Mr Udey Singh, president of the management committee of Budha Dal Public School and Dr Amrit Ujla, Principal of the school.

Goalkeeping her passion
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, January 29
Reetika Sharma, a Panchkula-based skater, has done the town proud by becoming the goalkeeper of the Indian women roller hockey team. Reetika, a Class XII student of Hansraj Public School, Sector 6, quelled her fears and opted to keep the goal in a sport where speed matters. Reetika says since the ball comes at very high speed and that too on a surface that offers very less friction, at times it becomes scary to keep the goal.

She learned the fundamentals of the sport from Mr Balwinder Singh Johal, whose dedication over the years helped her reach the pinnacle in her field.

Listing her achievements, Reetika said she took part in the sixth Women World Roller Hockey Championship held in Portugal, where she got an opportunity to play with several top teams of the world. She felt grateful to the Roller Skating Federation of India for giving the Indian team a chance to face world class teams.

In 2001, Reetika helped India win a bronze medal in the ninth Asian Roller Hockey meet in Taiwan. Last year, she clinched a gold medal for Haryana in the 32nd National Games held at Visakhapatnam. Reetika said her earlier contributions included gold medal in two national championships at Faridabad and Visakhapatnam, in 2001 and 2000, respectively. In 1999 and 2000, she was a member of the Haryana schools team and won gold medals in the National School Games held in Moga and Panchkula.

Producing TT champs
Arvind Katyal

Chandigarh
Table tennis has become synonymous with DAV Public School, Sector 8, which has already produced champions in just few years. The four tables installed in the school campus hall give ample opportunity to young trainees to groom into future Kamlesh Mehtas, Chetan Baboors of India.

Ms Sarita Manuja, Principal of the school, said since they did not have huge playgrounds, they thought of focussing on the sport. With the passage of time, the school began to show its prowess in table tennis.

Three years back, we saw signs of rapid improvement not only in this sport, but in other disciplines like basketball, gymnastics, swimming and shooting too, she added.

Ms Manuja said the school won the UT Inter-school TT Tournament for under-14 boys and girls, All-India Mahatma Hansraj Zonal TT Tournament, and CBSE Cluster XI TT Meet this session. In individual section, their star paddler Nadia Saini remained Haryana state champion. She also won titles in PGI Open, Kishan Lal Memorial, VIIIth Bhawan Hawk TT Meet and Hot Weather Open TT. Nadia also helped Haryana win the senior team championship. Other TT players of the school — Dev Saini, Meghna, Chetan Singla, Mahima Singla — also earned laurels.

Ms Manuja said their roller skater Isha Goel, swimmer Isha Kalia, shooters Akash Pahuja and Abhinav Kumar each bagged gold medals. Similarly, school gymnasts Priyanka and Shruti brought laurels in shooting. Ms Manuja was of the view that they usually focussed on those students were good at studies. She said one could always perform better in sports if one had a sound academic background.