Environmental challenges from the increasing medical waste since SARS outbreak.

ABSTRACT: Medical waste is a special class of hazardous pollutants. Improper treatment would cause secondary environmental pollution, especially when responding to public health emergencies. However, there are relatively few researches on the generation of medical waste, and there is a lack of basic understanding of its spatial-temporal heterogeneity. The outbreak of SARS in 2002 is a turning point in China's medical system reform. We estimated the production of medical waste and pollutants on a provincial scale in China from 2002 to 2018, using the data of medical statistics. Moreover, we forecasted the trend of medical waste in China until 2030, using a combination of environmental pressure model (STIRPAT) and time series model (ARIMA). We found that with the development of China's medical system

SUBMITTER: Wei Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7684014 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature