The type of waste generated in hospitals and pathological laboratories.

BIOMEDICAL WASTE (also accepted: hospital waste, medical waste).

Biomedical waste is waste produced during the diagnosis, treatment or immunisation of patients, or in related research — used syringes and needles, soiled dressings, blood bags, expired medicines, body tissues and laboratory cultures.

It is treated as a separate category because it is HAZARDOUS in two distinct ways: it is INFECTIOUS (it may carry pathogens such as HIV or hepatitis B) and it contains SHARPS that can injure handlers. Ordinary municipal waste is neither.

Disposal is by INCINERATION at high temperature, autoclaving, or deep burial, never by dumping in a general landfill. In India it is colour-coded into separate bins at source — yellow, red, white and blue — which is why hospitals keep several differently coloured bins side by side.

Note that biomedical waste is NON-BIODEGRADABLE in large part (plastics, syringes) and cannot be composted.