Dumping syringes in recycling bins is a crime
CORFU. Laboratory waste has been found in recycling bins, posing a danger to manual sorting workers.
In a Facebook post, the Mayor of Central Corfu, Stefanos Poulimenos, stated the following:
Despite the progress made, the efforts of the Municipality’s services to promote and increase recycling levels continue to face major obstacles due to the behaviour of a few members of the public and a small number of professionals.
As is well known, all recyclable materials collected at the first municipality-organised reception site, the Green Point at Tria Gefyria, as well as those that for years have been deposited at the five voluntary Green Corners in Liapades, Giannades, Spartylas, Gouvia, and Pelekas, along with those placed in the blue bins in the area of the Municipal Unit of Corfu, end up at the Recyclable Materials Sorting Centre (KDAY) in Temploni.
From these organised sites, recyclables are delivered to the KDAY with a high to near-absolute level of purity. However, this is not the case with materials placed in the blue bins, where unfortunately large percentages—between 40% and 50%—consist of mixed, non-recyclable waste, as some of us do not take the trouble to separate what should go into the blue bins from mixed waste that belongs in the green bins.
In recent days, Municipal Services were notified by the MRF that among the materials placed in the blue bins they frequently detect medical and other laboratory waste (syringes, etc.), which is not recyclable and, on the contrary, is dangerous to the people who manually sort recyclables at the MRF.
WE APPEAL to our fellow citizens, residents and professionals alike, not to dispose of laboratory waste in the waste management system—especially in recycling—since this behaviour ultimately becomes criminal toward our fellow human beings working at the KDAY, and also constitutes a violation of the sanitation regulations, for which there are very heavy fines and criminal penalties.
Beyond this, through our daily conduct we are all constantly being tested in terms of civic culture, a test in which Corfu cannot afford to fail.
ELENI KORONAKI
Photo: Stefanos Poulimenos
