The first-ever medical waste incineration plant was commissioned yesterday at the Juba Teaching Hospital in Juba. The facility is an edifice of the Canadian government and it is aimed at reducing the environmental and public health risks that can expose the population to infectious diseases. 

Director General of Juba Teaching Hospital, Anthony Lupai said during the facility’s inauguration that the waste management facility would provide support not only to the hospital but also to other health stakeholders in Juba. 

According to him, they need two or three men and women to be trained to that they can handle the insulator when it develops some problems as building the capacity of the local staff would help reduce the cost of management.

Emphasizing the importance of sustaining the facility to guarantee its long service, the World Health Organization’s Director for South Sudan, Dr. Fabina Ndenzako said “We have trained a team of 15 people and they have done several exercises to make sure they know how to run this facility. The WHO has a team of experts who will be working with trained people to make sure that the initial operation expected of this facility is really working in the right way”.

Janet Micheal, the Director-General for Nurses and Midwives in the Ministry of Health also noted that improper management of healthcare waste is a major source of diseases such as Hepatitis B due to the country’s inability to control the environment. She said that waste management facilities are essential in society, adding that it is the responsibility of citizens to protect the environment.

She said, “It is for us to preserve our environment, at many times hospital waste has been placed anywhere and it is very sad when you see children coming with used gloves, blowing those balloons, and then you find them using syringes to try to inject themselves”. 

Janet urged the health officials to make sure that the waste is properly sorted before being taken to the C100 medical waste incinerator. “We need to have the segregation early to avoid mixing of the waste, and for that, we will have 10 years for the facility to continue.”