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Malaysia recorded 8904 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) cases and 124 deaths as of 27 July 2020. Globally, everyday there are thousands of new cases of COVID-19 being recorded. Due to the high number of infections globally and nationwide the increase in the amount of clinical waste (CW) generation was expected. Malaysia has reported a 27% (by weight) increase in the generation of CW which was mostly attributed to COVID-19 related waste. This article presents the impacts of COVID-19 in waste generation, policy and regulation of CW management (CWM) in Malaysia and a case study on the CWM at a selected hospital used as a COVID-19 focal point. The current practice of CWM due to COVID-19 related cases follows the existing policy and legislation of CWM detailed in the Schedule Waste Regulation (2005), Environmental Quality Act, 1974, and with the standard operating procedure provided by the Ministry of Health, Malaysia. The case study conducted through survey and questionnaire interviews revealed that the CWM in government hospitals followed existing guidelines for CWM for COVID-19 waste, with some additional precautions and rules by the waste management contractors.

Environmental deterioration is caused by a variety of pollutants; however, heavy metals are often a major issue. Development and globalization has now also resulted in such pollution occurring in developing societies, including Africa and Asia. This review explores the geographical outlook of soil pollution with heavy metals. Various approaches used to remedy metal-polluted soils include physical, chemical, and biological systems, but many of these methods are not economically viable, and they do not ensure restoration without residual effects. This review evaluates the diverse use of plants and microbes in biotransformation and removal of heavy metals from contaminated soil. Mechanisms on how natural processes utilizing plants (phytoremediation) and microorganisms (bioremediation) remove or reduce heavy metals from soil at various levels are presented. This review concludes that remediation technologies are necessary for the recovery of metal-contaminated environments and the prevention of continuous environmentally toxic impacts on living organisms.

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Soil environment is a major sink for a multitude of chemicals and heavy metals, which inevitably leads to environmental contamination problems. Various human activities including agricultural, urban or industrial, or landfilling are major contributors to heavy metal contamination in the environment. Since landfilling is one of the ultimate waste disposal methods, the generation of leachate is inevitable. Leachate from landfill is highly heterogeneous and consist high amount of heavy metal. Subsequent movement of the leachate into the surrounding soil, ground water or surface water could lead to severe pollution problems to and cause toxicity to human and other living organisms. Microorganisms has the ability to solubilize the metals (or increase their bioavailability) via the production of siderophores and adsorb the metals in their biomass on metal-induced outer membrane proteins and by bio precipitation. Therefore this study aimed to remediate heavy metal in leachate contaminated soil from a closed non-sanitary landfill in Kuala Lumpur. Preliminary soil and leachate characterization revealed high amount of metal contaminants as compared to the prescribed limit by local and international standard. Total of eighteen microbes were isolated from the contaminated site and were grouped into two treatments, proteobacteria and non-proteo bacteria.Comparison between the treatments revealed that proteobacteria (Treatment A) were performing higher metal removal activity compared to non-proteobacteria (Treatment B) and control (Treatment C). Out of four metals tested in this study, three of the metals (As (71.86%), Ni (50.8%), Al (87.15%)) were removed significantly by the addition of Treatment A. Highest metal removal rate constant was obtained for Al at 0.02 day -1 . Therefore, it can be concluded that the addition of microbes, namely proteobacteria to leachate contaminated soil can remove the heavy metal content at a significant rate.

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