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Malaysia sends plastic waste back to France M alaysia's env i r o n m e n t minister has revealed that her country has returned 43 containers of plastic waste to France since late last year, and warned that the South East Asian nation would not become “the garbage dump of the world”. A total of 150 containers have been returned – representing 3,737 metric tonnes of unwanted waste - to 13 predominantly rich countries; France was the biggest offender, but 42 containers were also shipped to the UK.
Many wealthy countries send their waste overseas because it is cheap, helps meet recycling targets and reduces domestic landfill. The Euro pean Union is the largest exporter of plastic waste, with the US leading as the top exporter for a single country. Following China's decision in 2018 to ban the import of plastic, these shipments of rubbish have increasing ly been redirected to other South East Asian countries like Malaysia, the Philip pines and Indonesia.
These countries do not have the capacity to process as much plastic as China, however, and handling the waste has fast become a problem, leading to an increase in the number of containers being returned. A recent Greenpeace investiga tion found British recycling and household waste intend ed for reprocessing had been dumped openly at sites near the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, increasing concerns that household rubbish was not always being processed correctly.
“If people want to see us as the rubbish dump of the world, you can dream on,” Yeo Bee Yin, Malaysia's environment minister told reporters during inspection at a Penang port. “Enforcement action was taken on contain ers which contained plastic waste imported illegally,” she said, citing the Basel Convention, an international treaty designed to restrict movements of hazardous wastes between nations. ■
Online sick notes
Awebsite offering to sign you off sick from work in just a few clicks has caused anger among the country's health care workers. The website issues arrêts maladies for up to three days for just €25, which it claims can be reim bursed, and has generated much attention since its launch in January.
After filling out an online questionnaire, patients suffering from “simple and common” ailments such as gastro, colds and migraines are offered an online consultation with a “doctor” via the website arretmaladie.fr. The platform has been created by Dr Can Ansay, a German lawyer; a similar site has been operating in Germany since 2018.
“This site is an intolerable abuse of the system,” complained Dr Jean-Paul Hamon, president of the Fondation des médecins de France. “We have brought this up with the director of the Caisse nationale de l’assurance maladie, who assured me that his le
gal team was on hand to shut it down, but I am not sure if that is legally pos sible. As doctors we are very cautious with handing out work sick notes. We are witnessing a degradation of the function of physicians and if the au thorities can not stop this, there is a risk of serious abuse.”
“This represents an inversion of the responsibility of proof,” said Jérôme Marty, president of a large doctor's un ion. “It is now up to the patient to indicate the date of their arrêts maladies, with the doctor who signs it apparently free to backdate it... this is therefore fake and illegal! Furthermore, how can you know that the person you've spo ken to is an actual doctor?”
Although legal proceedings against the site are planned, under current rules it would not appear to be illegal and employers are forced to recognise the sick notes and continue to pay their employees during their absence. ■
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