Waste Medic – Page 26

Articles by: Waste Medic

How to Respond Effectively to Covid-19 Waste Generation

April 1, 2020

The covid-19 pandemic threatens to create large amounts of new waste, particularly for resource managers at organizations that aren’t in the healthcare sector. Manufacturers, businesses, governments, schools, universities and others that don’t normally deal with potentially infectious waste may be unsure how to respond safely and responsibly. As the novel coronavirus continued spreading, Environment + Energy Leader asked Wade Scheel, director of government affairs for the environmental and regulated waste management solutions company Stericycle, for […]

Nobody Predicted This

April 1, 2020

I don’t recall seeing the coronavirus listed in any predictions for garbage and recycling in 2020. Nor, I suspect, did any solid waste plans have contingencies for managing garbage and recycling in a pandemic. After all, we have so little experience in this area. As I write this, no one really knows when this will be over. We are trying to figure out how to react, what changes to make in our programs and what […]

The COVID-19 pandemic is generating tons of medical waste

April 1, 2020

Garbage contaminated with bodily fluids or other infectious materials is becoming a bigger concern for hospitals as they brace for a surge in patients sick with COVID-19 in the US. Patients and health care workers are quickly going through medical supplies and disposable personal protective equipment, like masks. Eventually all that used gear piles up as medical waste that needs to be safely discarded. In Wuhan, where the novel coronavirus first emerged, officials didn’t just […]

The first days on the front line

April 1, 2020

The first case of the COVID-19 virus in the U.S. was diagnosed on Jan. 20. By March 26, the United States became the epicenter of the pandemic as domestic cases surpassed those in China and Italy for the first time. In the process, the steady uptick of domestic infections set in motion the nationwide closure of countless businesses and schools, cancelation of travel, and shelter in place orders. As life has abruptly been put […]

Healthcare Waste Institute’s FAQs Regarding COVID-19

March 13, 2020

The Healthcare Waste Institute (HWI) developed this FAQ to provide information about the evolving Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak first identified in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China. What is COVID-19? Coronavirus is a group of viruses named for the way they look under a microscope (“corona” meaning “crown”). The novel (or new) coronavirus, identified in 2019 during an investigation into an outbreak in Wuhan, China, causes the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The first case of […]

Patient Lawsuits for HIPAA-Related Breaches

March 5, 2020

HIPAA-related lawsuits came to the attention of Alexander Wolff when a fellow attorney called him with a case a few years ago. The plaintiff was a woman and friend of a man who was dating a nurse. The nurse, who worked at a hospital where the plaintiff received healthcare, was suspicious that the plaintiff and man were having an affair, so she accessed the woman’s chart. The nurse sent the man screen shots of the […]

Shortage of personal protective equipment endangering health workers worldwide

March 5, 2020

The World Health Organization has warned that severe and mounting disruption to the global supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) – caused by rising demand, panic buying, hoarding and misuse – is putting lives at risk from the new coronavirus and other infectious diseases. Healthcare workers rely on personal protective equipment to protect themselves and their patients from being infected and infecting others. But shortages are leaving doctors, nurses and other frontline workers dangerously ill-equipped […]

Anxiety mounts among U.S. health workers on the front lines of coronavirus outbreak

March 5, 2020

Doctors and nurses say they are alarmed by reports that multiple health workers in the United States have been sickened by a deadly coronavirus and that hospitals and other healthcare facilities appear to have become hot spots for the spread of infections. On Sunday, health officials announced that two staff members at a Northern California hospital had contracted COVID-19 from a patient. A day earlier, officials said that a health worker at a Seattle nursing […]

Public Health vs. Patient Privacy – How Coronavirus Is Putting HIPAA to the Test

March 5, 2020

In a recent blog post, colleagues in our Employment, Labor & Workforce Management practice addressed the legal framework pertaining to coronavirus (COVID-19) risks in the workplace. As the number of cases continues to the climb in the U.S., it is imperative that HIPAA covered entities and their business associates are aware of their privacy and security responsibilities in the midst of this public health emergency. EBG provides this guidance on how to effectively respond to the coronavirus public […]

LabCorp security lapse exposed thousands of medical documents

February 2, 2020

A security flaw in LabCorp’s website exposed thousands of medical documents, like test results containing sensitive health data. It’s the second incident in the past year after LabCorp said in June that 7.7 million patients had been affected by a credit card data breach of a third-party payments processor. That breach also hit several other laboratory testing companies, including Quest Diagnostics. This latest security lapse was caused by a vulnerability on a part of LabCorp’s […]

Articles by: Waste Medic

Instagram