‘I’m a nurse, that equipment is needed’: Medics and care workers ‘angry’ over huge PPE graveyard where thousands of boxes of ‘precious’ aprons and masks have been dumped near nature reserve
- Thousands of boxes were dumped in New Forest town of Calmore, Hampshire
- The PPE is due to be removed and recycled into plastic bags for public use
Healthcare workers today reacted angrily after thousands of boxes of ‘precious’ PPE equipment were dumped near a nature reserve.
Piles of boxes containing aprons and face masks were left in an enormous heap in the New Forest town of Calmore, bordering Testwood Lakes Nature Reserve and AFC Totton Football Club.
Local residents and care workers have now questioned why the valuable equipment has been wasted, and who would have dumped it next to a beauty spot.
New Forest District Council has said the PPE is due to be removed from the site, and an investigation is underway.
Nicci Toy, a young nurse who lives nearby and often walks around the lake said: ‘It makes me really angry.
Thousands of boxes of PPE have been dumped next to a nature reserve in Hampshire
The boxes contain piles of PPE including aprons and masks, leaving healthcare workers fuming
‘I haven’t seen it there in person but I’ve heard it’s an overwhelming amount. It’s scary. I’m a nurse – that equipment is needed.
‘I can’t believe it’s NHS equipment, they wouldn’t just dump it there. It’s got to be private.
‘It would have to be quite planned out to get it there too. It’s not easy to get to. It baffles me how it got there.’
A nurse who works at local Laurel Care Home said: ‘We could have used that stuff. It’s precious.
‘Why has it just been dumped there? It could be from a hospital maybe, there’s so much of it. Or one of the industrial estates.’
The discovery was uncovered at a Hampshire County Council (HCC) meeting, when it was revealed the ‘large scale’ littering had taken place but the origin of the vital equipment remains unknown.
A district council spokesperson said it carried out a routine inspection as part of its annual inspection regime on April 4.
They said: ‘This inspection revealed that a large quantity of PPE was being stored on the land in contravention of the caravan site licence conditions.
‘The council, in its licensing capacity, has requested that the stored items be removed from the land.
‘Subsequent inspections have been carried out by Hampshire County Council and the Environment Agency.
‘All the material is packaged and palletised and is due to be removed from the site for processing and recycling into plastic bags over the coming weeks.
‘The Environment Agency will continue to carry out further enquiries as to the source of the material and how it came to be present on the land.’
Householders living opposite the lake are also furious at the largescale equipment dump.
A local man in his 60s said: ‘We heard about it through the grapevine but I haven’t actually seen it myself. Why has it just been dumped by the side of the lake? It can be used by hospitals.
‘It is such a waste of stuff that is always needed. It makes me angry.’
One woman, 79, said: ‘It’s dreadful. People are always flytipping around there, it’s such a shame.’
HCC have contacted the Environment Agency to work out whether the protective gear was left during the pandemic because it was defective.
A report from the HCC Regulatory Committee meeting, revealed the discovery was made following an investigation by New Forest District Council into use of land at Little Testwood Farm Caravan Park, Hampshire.
The council have now launched an ‘enforcement activity’ with the Environment Agency, police and New Forest District Council to find out further details.
Julian Lewis MP for New Forest East said: ‘The unauthorised disposal of such a huge quantity of medical aprons should be relatively easy to investigate and its history traced.
‘One long term lesson from all this is that never again should the United Kingdom be caught without strategic reserve stocks of protective medical clothing.’
Councillor Peter Latham, who is chairman of the Regulatory Committee, said he and fellow members were shocked when they were made aware of the dumping.
‘It was a surprise to put it mildly – a reaction of horror,’ he said.
‘That something like that could have happened in Hampshire and nobody knew about it.
‘It looked to us just like the masks, but there could be aprons as well.
‘It should have been properly disposed of, probably to a recycling centre.
‘We don’t know where it came from and who put it there.
‘Clearly it shouldn’t have been dumped there – we’re looking into the land registry to see who owns the land to see what was agreed between those who dumped it.
‘Ideally we wish to know who owns the PPE in the first place, who was responsible for disposing it, why they disposed of it there.’
A council officer told members that the PPE kits were ‘hidden away’, adding: ‘It is a really good example of where there has been an illegal dumping of waste.’
An aerial view shows the vast extent of the dumping as mountains of PPE containers are visible
HCC have contacted the Environment Agency to work out whether the protective gear was left during the pandemic
Council committee members were left bemused at how such a huge example of fly-tipping could have gone unnoticed
Mr Latham, who has been chair of the Regulatory Committee for six years, continued: ‘I’ve never seen anything like this before.
‘None of us have.’
The mountain of PPE will now be removed and recycled into plastic bags over the next few weeks.
During the Covid pandemic the Department for Health and Social Care spent £12 billion on PPE – but the allocation of contracts and purchasing of medical clothing has been the subject of much criticism.
In 2022, the government revealed DHSC lost 75 per cent of its first year budget to inflated prices and defective kit – including £4 billion of unusable PPE which was set to be be burnt ‘to generate power’.
The report into the discovery from the HCC reads: ‘Following their own investigations into the use of land as a caravan park, New Forest District Council reported the large-scale storage of packs of old PPE.
‘It became apparent that thousands of packs of medical aprons had been dumped on the land with no obvious signs that they were being protected or stored for some future use.
‘The concern is that they have been dumped with no intention of removal to a proper facility.
‘The EA have been contacted to see if they can determine where the PPE originated and whether it was discarded by a Health Trust as substandard during the Covid procurement.
‘Enquiries have been made with Land Registry to ascertain land ownership, although this has flagged up a possible HCC link as we are mentioned in one clause in relation to a s106 Agreement.’
An EA spokesperson confirmed they were due to visit the site this week, adding: ‘We are unable to comment further in order to not prejudice any investigations or subsequent enforcement decisions.’
HCC has said it is unwilling to comment until the outcome of its investigation.
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