NEW DELHI (AP) — An estimated 20 million people around the world help keep cities clean by scavenging through landfills and dumps. Experts say these trash pickers, who sometimes toil alongside paid municipal sanitation workers, provide a vital service, yet they usually are not on a priority list for vaccines against the coronavirus. The pandemic has amplified the health risks they face and few have their own protective gear or even clean water to wash their hands. The trash pickers often find it hard to get vaccines because they are not considered by the government to be essential workers or cannot afford to wait at overburdened public hospitals for free shots.
