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General information, not medical, legal or environmental advice. Call Triple Zero (000) in an emergency, or go to the emergency department of your nearest hospital. These are Victoria’s rules only. The official page is EPA Victoria’s guide to clinical and related industrial waste.

NOTE MW-2 · VICTORIA

Clinical waste in Victoria

In Victoria, EPA Victoria regulates clinical and related industrial waste, including its transport, temporary storage, and treatment and disposal. The waste is reportable priority waste, and EPA Victoria lists seven duties under the Environment Protection Act 2017 that apply to anyone who generates, transports or receives clinical waste.

Note
MW-2
State
Victoria
Law
Environment Protection Act 2017
Date checked
8 Oct 2026

Field 01Sources of the waste

EPA Victoria · Victoria

EPA Victoria describes the waste by where it is made before it says what is in it. “Clinical and related industrial waste comes from:”

  • “medical facilities, such as hospitals”
  • “dental surgeries”
  • “veterinary clinics”
  • “laboratories”
  • “podiatrists”
  • “brothels”
  • “blood banks”
  • “mortuaries.”

“Examples of activities that generate clinical and related industrial waste are:”

  • “tattooing”
  • “body piercing”
  • “emergency services”
  • “nursing”
  • “pharmaceutical procedures.”

The list reaches well past hospitals. Tattooing and body piercing are on it, and so are podiatrists, brothels and mortuaries.

Field 03Duties

Because clinical and related industrial waste is reportable priority waste under the Environment Protection Regulations 2021, duties under the Environment Protection Act 2017 apply to anyone managing, transporting or depositing it. EPA Victoria adds: “These duties apply to anyone who generates, transports or receives clinical waste.” EPA Victoria’s page names them.

State rule · Victoria

“The duties are:”

  1. “duties of persons depositing industrial waste”
  2. “duty of persons involved in transporting industrial waste”
  3. “duties of persons receiving industrial waste”
  4. “duties of persons managing priority waste”
  5. “duty to investigate alternatives to waste disposal”
  6. “duty to notify us [EPA Victoria] of transaction in reportable priority waste”
  7. “duty of persons transporting reportable priority waste.”

“The general environmental duty also applies.”

That is the whole list as EPA Victoria’s page gives it. The words of each duty are in the Act and the regulations, which EPA Victoria’s page links; read them there before relying on any one of them.

Field 04Treatment and permissions

State rule · Victoria

The waste “must be treated before final disposal – for example, by incineration (burning) or autoclave (sterilising).”

EPA Victoria says this is to make the waste non-hazardous and inoffensive, and to allow it to be disposed of safely.

“The treatment process itself must comply with the general environmental duty and the conditions of your permission.”

“It is the responsibility of the waste generator to ensure that all waste types are only sent to treatment facilities that have a permission for those specific waste types.”

“You must also get a permission to conduct certain activities involving clinical and related industrial waste. Permissions have conditions that must be followed.”

“You need an A21 – Temporary storage – biomedical waste registration to store 40m3 or less of any biomedical waste. This does not apply to biomedical waste generated at the site by a council, a health service or an ambulance service.”

Field 05Department of Health guidance

Guidance for healthcare facilities · Victoria

Victoria’s Department of Health, in its infection control guidance for healthcare facilities, says that when it is unclear how to get rid of leftover pharmaceuticals, they should go back to a pharmacy to be disposed of correctly.

That is guidance, not one of EPA Victoria’s duties, and it is written for healthcare facilities.

Field 06Other states

None of this carries across the border. New South Wales classes sharps waste as special waste and NSW Health writes guidance on sharps in the community: see clinical waste in New South Wales. Western Australia works through its own Act and the WA Department of Health’s code: see clinical waste in Western Australia.

Other states and territories

This site holds no official medical waste rules for Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, the ACT or the Northern Territory, so it gives none. For those places, check with that state or territory’s own environment regulator or health department.

Other states’ descriptions of the waste are in what counts as clinical waste. Back to the cover note.