Recently published reports reveal that the Cook Islands, Kiribati, Tuvalu and the Maldives have phased out the use of dental amalgam. Especially for small island states without an adequate hazardous waste management, environmental pollution from the use of amalgam is a major problem. With these four island states, the number of countries where amalgam is no longer used or is only kept for emergency cases rises to 66.
The Minamata Initial Assessment reports from Cook Islands, Tuvalu and Kiribati have now been uploaded to the website of the Minamata Convention on Mercury and the report from the Maldives was already uploaded to the Ministry of Environment already in 2019, but apparently not yet submitted to the Convention.
Here are the details about the use of dental amalgam.
Tuvalu:
Since 2019, it was noted that Tuvalu no longer uses dental amalgam but still has some in storage awaiting disposal at the Department of Health.
Kiribati:
The Dental Unit is responsible for, and is, phasing out the use of dental amalgam in their new system. However, these are sometimes used …as needed. Old stocks of dental amalgam are currently being stored and need to be addressed.
Cook Islands:
… since 2021, the use of dental amalgam had been largely phased out. It is, however, still available in some cases of emergency or upon request from elderly patients who were averse to newer versions of fillings.
Maldives:
The use of mercury based dental amalgam is almost completely phased out except in rare cases where it is kept for use in emergency cases in some hospitals. This has been verified and confirmed during the survey conducted to assess the mercury in hospitals.
The Minamata Initial Assessments funded by the Global Environmental Fund are invaluable resources to get an overview of the actual use of amalgam.More than 80 developing countries have already carried out an inventory and submitted it to the Sekretariat of the Minamata Convention (here is the link to the list).
The following 36 countires have received fundings for an inventory with an expected duration of 24 months, but the projects are still ongoing or ended without submitting a report.
Europe and Central Asia:
Belarus* (2017)
Kyrgyzstan* (2018)
Turkey (2016)
Latin America:
Brazil (2014)
Cuba (2020)
Dominica*, Grenada* Saint Vincent and the Grenadines* (2017)
El Salvador (2017)
Honduras (2016)
Nicaragua(2020)
Asia Pacific
Afghanistan (2020)
Bahrain* (2024)
Cambodia*(2014)
China (2014)
India (2015?)
Iraq(2017)
Lao (2016)
Micronesia* (2018)
Myanmar* (Suspended)
Niue* (2018)
Oman (2021)
Papua New Guinea*( 2015)
Qatar(2022)
Thailand (2022)
Tonga (2016)
Vanuatu (2016)
Africa
Angola* Malawi* Zimbabwe (2014)
Burundi* (2015)
Djibouti (2015)
Eswatini, Namibia (2015)
Kenya ?
Liberia (2022)
Morocco* (2016)
Mozambique (2015)
* Not yet Parties of the Minamata Convention
bold: Countries from which information about the use of amalgam is also missing from other submissions to the Convention
We have updated the Global Tracker of Counries Phasing Out Dental Amalgam with the new information:
