Garin hits 55% decrease in environmental and pollution control program budget in 2023

Iloilo Representative Janet Garin on Tuesday decried the P1.22 billion proposed 2023 budget for the Environmental Regulations and Pollution Control Program under the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, which is a 55.7% or P1.53 billion lower than this year's P2.75 billion.

Garin, vice chairperson of House appropriations panel, noted that the cut would affect the implementation of the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Solid Waste Management Act, and hazardous waste management regulations.

"It is very much untimely to slash the budget for healthcare waste programs because the country is still in the midst of a pandemic and COVID-19 cases are still being reported daily, indicating that it continues to generate waste," she said in a statement.

Garin then cited DENR data which showed that  a total of 634,687.73 metric tons of healthcare waste were generated in 2021 which is equivalent to 52,890 metric tons each month, a roughly 500% increase from pre-COVID baseline figure.

"While COVID-19 cases in the country have started to decline, virus-contaminated healthcare wastes generated by the situation have continuously become a challenge and addressing the issue of proper healthcare waste disposal is still of paramount concern,” she pointed out.

The former Health secretary also asked the DENR to address the complaints of some local government units (LGUs) whose healthcare waste are not collected on time from their preliminary treatment and storage facilities.

“LGUs have been told to store these medical waste, however, ang tagal na sa storage, may ilang LGUs ang hindi agad nakakapagtapon ng kanilang medical waste sa mga sanitary landfill dahil walang kumukuha. We are asking the DENR to look into this as the consequences of improper handling and disposal of medical waste are serious,” she said.

The DENR-Waste Management Program provides that the agency has to assist LGUs, particularly those in remote areas, in funding their own special waste facilities which will serve as a temporary and transit point for COVID 19-related healthcare waste before it is transported to treatment, storage, and disposal (TSD) facilities.

The COVID-19 healthcare waste program for LGUs, on the other hand. is solely intended to store medical waste collected from households, vaccination sites, and quarantine facilities.

It does not cover the handling of medical trash received from hospitals, which is collected directly by registered TSD and transported to landfills.—Llanesca Panti/AOL, GMA News