Hospitals reconsider
shipping out waste
Resistance in California
By Helen Altonn
and the costs of transport
prod isle hospitals to look
at relocating Castle's incinerator
Star-BulletinOahu hospitals are backing away, at least temporarily, from plans to send medical waste to a mainland incinerator.
Costs and politics have caused the retrenching, said Richard Meiers, Healthcare Association of Hawaii president and chief executive officer.
The hospitals are looking into other options for medical waste disposal, such as acquiring their own incinerator or possibly relocating Castle Medical Center's incinerator, he said.
Castle was burning pathological and chemotherapy waste from nine other hospitals until Feb. 1, when the practice was halted because of community concerns.
The hospitals then negotiated with Matson Navigation Co. to ship the waste to a disposal facility in Oakland.
Total costs are estimated at $400,000, he said, including picking up the waste, packing it in appropriate storage containers and, on the other end, inspecting it and transporting it from the ship to the incinerator.
With Hawaii's economic slump, he said hospital leaders felt, "Why should we be spending $400,000 of our health care dollars in California, with no return here in Hawaii?"
Reception in California is another worry, Meiers said, noting newspaper headlines such as: "We Send Hawaii Our Tourists. They Send Us Their Medical Waste" and "Hawaii's Waste Washes Up on California Shores."
A demonstration was held recently against the Oakland incinerator because it burns a lot of plastics, he said.
About 18,000 pounds of accumulated medical waste -- largely placentas from births -- were burned in June at the state Agriculture Department's Halawa incinerator.
That cleared hospital freezers, and they should be able to handle their waste until about Oct. 21, unless there's a big birth month, Meiers said.
He said the association is talking to vendors about incinerator costs and exploring some new technologies and other ideas. The association also would have to find a site, either for a new incinerator or to relocate Castle's.
