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March 13, 198% News 985-2131) Classified 986-6222 Distribution 96-1337) 4% pages 25¢ = SEE Fr Tae LP ORE Ee

HOSPITAL CAN'T MEET STANDARDS

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LIONS GATE Hospital will stop burning its potentially in- fectious waste by early April because its incinerators cannot

meet gir emission standards.

A portion of the estimated 1,100 pounds of biomedical and poten- dally infectious waste produced daily by the hospital is currently being trucked to an incinerator run by the Thermal Reduction Co. in Ferndale, Washington.

And the hospital's acting presi- dent Eric O'Dell said GH will soon stop incinerating all of its biomedical waste “because we can’t get the incinerators upgraded sufficiently, And we don't like pumping out that black smoke. It's embarrassing.”

He said LGH recently invested $11,000 in upgrading its in- cinerators, but they still can't reach the temperatures required to incinerate inereasingly complex hospital waste and the exploding amount of plastic and disposable products used in modern hospitals.

The present incinerators were installed in 1961 and have been rebuilt twice.

O'Dell estimated the cast to in- stall incinerators that could burst the hospital’s current waste pro- duction and still meet air emission standards would be close to $500,000.

LGH currently ships between 200 and 300 pounds daily of wastes such as used hypodermic needles, pathological waste and material from infectious patients to the Ferndale incinerator. The balance

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Ry TIMOTHY RENSHAW

News Reporter

will be shipped to Washington once the hoespimai's own ine cinerators are uo longer used: or will be sent to the new $75 million Greater Vancouver Regional District incinerator in Burnaby if and when that facility begins burn. ing hospital waste,

MY'Dell said he would tike to see the establishment of a central pro- vincial Mecility that could handle hospital waste.

LGH waste destined tor in- cineration in Washington is ship- ped through Coquitlan’s Brown ing-Ferris Industries (BRI) Lad. Medical Waste Systems, which currently trucks approximately one ton of Lower Mainland hospital waste weekly fo the Washington State facility.

BFI officials have said they ex. pect business from area haspitals to boom as they, like LGU, in creasingly face the problem of what to do with wastes. that will not be accepted at local landfills and .cannot be burned in’ inade- quate incinerators.

O'Dell said his hospital began looking for alternatives for its biomedical waste disposal after

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a3 NEWS photo Mike Waketiold

MARKE G.A. MAZEPPA is one of over 20 Capilano College Art Institute students

a who will be showing their work in an exhibit that opens on campus Tuesday, March

15. His bronze casting will be featured along with stone carvings, more castings, mixed media and some works in progress. The show is on until March 25, 10:30-4:30, in the All College Lounge, located in the A building on the south campus. \

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