Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 2, 1990 TAG: 9005020240
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
"It's a costly piece of regulation that really is not going to improve the public health in any way," said Dr. John H. Keene, a Richmond-area clinical biologist and medical consultant.
"Personally, I'm very disillusioned and disappointed in the way the whole situation was handled," said Keene, who also is president-elect of the Association for Practitioners in Infection Control in Virginia.
Keene was one of several medical experts who tried to help the Virginia Department of Waste Management draft the regulations, which were adopted in November by the agency board.
He described the effort as frustrating.
According to Keene, the state refused to listen to the medical community and amend the rules.
But Cynthia V. Bailey, executive director of the Waste Management Department, said the medical community "backed off" the regulations it helped draft.
The dispute may result in only grudging compliance with the new rules.
In the April issue of Virginia Medical, a magazine for state medical professionals, Dr. Raymond S. Brown wrote: "Even though . . . there have been no public health problems associated with the previous disposal of these wastes, we are now shouldered with these rules.
"We can and will obey the law, but the increased cost will necessarily, as always, be passed on to the public," Brown wrote.
The state's definition of infectious wastes includes needles and other sharp objects used in contact with blood or body fluids; blood and blood products; laboratory cultures; body parts; animal carcasses and other materials used in research with potentially infectious organisms; and soil, water or other materials possibly contaminated by infectious waste.
Most of the wastes already were disposed of separately from common garbage.
Bailey questioned whether the regulations will result in higher costs and said the rules provide exemptions to those who generate small amounts of wastes - such as doctors' offices - and flexibility in defining what is potentially infectious.
"What we've tried to do is recognize that the doctors and health-care professionals are the ones in the best position to determine what's infectious," she said.
But Keene said most medical wastes do not threaten public health or the health of landfill operators, who have refused to accept such materials.
The state is trying to protect public health from viruses and organisms that usually do not survive long outside the body, Keene said.
"Most infectious diseases are spread from person to person, not through the trash," he said.
Keene also said he thinks the state should allow chemical decontamination rather than just incineration or steam sterilization.
Bailey said that issue will be reconsidered by the state board.
by CNB