Council says this waste has been placed out by families and individuals who have been through a highly traumatic event and having people go through their belongings is devastating.

"Please don't touch these personal items or take things for your own use," a council spokesperson said. "The flood waste is there to be collected because it is contaminated, it has not been placed out because it is unwanted."

The flood clean-up continues across the Manning and already flood waste has "significantly" exceeded the annual amount of waste collected across the Mid Coast in red bins.

So far more than 40,000 tonnes of flood waste has been collected from homes, businesses and streets across the MidCoast region. The amount of waste removed on the first 14 days of the clean-up effort is significantly more than the 25,000 tonnes collected each year from red bins across the entire region.

"The clean-up is just the beginning, we will be recovering from this flood event for a long time," MidCoast Council's director of liveable communities, Paul De Szell said.