New York City sanitation workers are reporting a sharp rise in needle-stick injuries tied to the booming use of at-home weight-loss injections and other self-administered injectable drugs. From the start of the year through early June, the department logged 35 injuries, a pace that could exceed 80 by year-end. That compares with 46 cases in all of 2025, 36 in 2024, and just 25 in 2019.
Veteran Staten Island sanitation worker Mike Plotkin said the trend is visible on his own garbage truck route. Over the past 14 months, he said, 15 incidents occurred among his crew, with coworkers pricked by needles hidden in household trash among snack wrappers and used paper. Plotkin, who runs the blog Behind the Truck, linked the increase to GLP-1 drugs such as Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro, and to many ordinary residents now injecting medicines at home without medical training. He said sanitation workers are parents, spouses and children too, and urged the public not to expose them to dangerous waste.
Each incident can sideline a worker for washing, reporting, a hospital visit, risk assessment and sometimes HIV post-exposure prophylaxis. The CDC says PEP must begin within 72 hours and lasts 28 days. Some workers never report injuries, because the process is painful, invasive and may cost them work time, so the true number is likely higher.
City sanitation spokesman Vincent Gragnani said residents must follow safety rules. Under New York City regulations, used syringes must go into rigid red sharps containers marked as biohazard waste. If people do not have one, they can use a thick plastic laundry-detergent bottle labeled clearly for sharps, or bring the needles to hospitals or pharmacies, which must accept them. Gragnani warned that simply recapping a needle and tossing it in regular trash is not enough, since caps can come loose during collection and compression.
The problem reflects a broader boom in injectable weight-loss and longevity products. A late-2025 Gallup survey found one in eight U.S. adults currently uses weight-loss drugs, and nearly one in five has tried them, with both figures doubling in 18 months. A KFF survey found 17% of users got the drug from an online site or provider, sometimes via China through WhatsApp. New York doctors said many clinics now give patients disposal guidance, but some online telehealth providers do not, leaving users unsure how to discard needles safely.
