BA rubbish remains uncollected, rain sparks new health concerns

Buenos Aires City streets remained littered with piles of rubbish bags today; amid a continued strike by CEAMSE rubbish processing workers. The interruption on waste collection reached its seventh day today sparking new health concerns by city residents, as heavy downpours have been forecasted.

Rubbish bags have been piling up on Belgrano, Palermo, Barrio Norte, Microcentro, and other central city neighbourhoods for the past few days, causing concern and sanitation risks due to the extremely hot weather in the city, plus the water shortages affecting certain areas.

Sources from the municipal Public Spaces Ministry said yesterday that “the situation in the transfer and sanitation landfill plants has been normalized,” adding that they are “sweeping and cleaning corners where rubbish accumulated.”

Alberto Términe, head of the city’s DGLIM cleaning department said yesterday that: “We will conclude all waste collection and cleaning up throughout (yesterday) so that tomorrow things are back to normal and we can avoid the troubles that the storm may cause.”

Términe also said that this conflict may have been resolved but the “insufficient capacity of the sanitation landfill is a real problem and we need to find a solution for it, otherwise we’ll face this issue again.”

In the face of the strike staged by Ceamse workers grouped under the AGOEC union, which was allegedly resolved on Tuesday, there were still mountains of rubbish in Balvanera, La Boca, Constitución, Monserrat, Puerto Madero, Recoleta, Retiro, San Nicolás, San Telmo, Almagro, Barracas, Palermo, Villa Crespo and Chacarita.