As reported by Terra Verde to the newspaper La Vanguardia, this type of sanitary waste (mandil, gloves, masks) contains chlorinated plastic components in large proportion and its residues form a heterogeneous mass which, when incinerated, "generates persistent organic pollutants and bioaccumulates of high toxicity". The incineration of this waste is "one of the main sources of dioxins", so the WHO regulates that its management should be a process different from that of urban waste. On the other hand, the Basel Convention "recommends treating these wastes with technologies other than burning them".

On the contrary, the Generalitat has ensured that it follows the guidelines of the Ministry for the Ecological Transition of Spain: "The possibility of incineration of health waste in municipal facilities is a possibility provided for in the instructions of the Ministry for the Ecological Transition".

Health waste from 30 hospitals that are moved to the incinerator in Mataró has incinerated about 400 tonnes in two weeks. According to the municipal consortium that manages the waste plant, the regulation recommends "prioritising the incineration of waste contaminated by the Covid-19 plague and the incineration of infections that cannot be treated in conventional facilities". And the director of the incinerator, Carles Salesa, said that "these materials have nothing to do with those that carry a large proportion of chlorinated plastics" (PVC type), which are largely precursors of organochlorine pollutants.

However, environmentalists have warned that the alarm created two decades ago in the Maresme region is repeated, when a study showed that in Mataró and Arenys de Mar the level of dioxins in blood exceeded by 20 times the limit set by the European directive.

Terra Verde recalled that a few weeks ago, before the confinement decree, the Catalan Parliament adopted a motion to draft a plan for the closure and demolition of incineration plants in Catalonia. On the other hand, they say that the rules established by the state for burning sanitary waste "have only been created for emergency cases", so that, depending on the environmental risks, differentiated incinerations should be carried out.

Another of the irregularities reported by ecologists concerns the working conditions of health waste transporters. Terra Verde says that the personnel carrying out the transportation are working "without any specific training and without regulatory knowledge" and that the trucks are circulating "without having enough visibility on what they carry" and with great deficiencies in hygiene measures.

The incineration plant in Mataró, which serves the municipalities of the Maresme region, is managed by the French multinational Veolia.