Eco health group bucks return of incinerators

AN environmental health group on Monday renewed its call for the Philippine government to stop paying for a 15-year old medical waste incineration project that costs the Filipino people close to $2 million a year in debt service.

Health Care Without Harm-Southeast Asia reminded Philippine leaders of the need to scrap the P503-million Austrian Medical Waste Incinerator Project that provided medical waste incinerators to 26 public hospitals nationwide.

The Philippine government continues to pay nearly $2 million or about P88 million every year until 2014, Merci Ferrer of the Health Care group said.

“We reiterate that our government should stop the payment of the unscrupulous debt. The money that we are allocating for this payment should be used to fund other health care needs and improvements in health care waste management,” Ferrer added.

The Philippine and Austrian governments signed the loan agreement to help in the proper disposal of medical waste in 1999. The Philippines has since banned the use of incinerators for general waste and subsequently, the use of incinerators for medical wastes in 2003.

The Philippines remains the only country in the world that bans incinerators, but it still pays close to $2 million yearly.

Government agencies such as the Department of Health, Department of Environment and Natural Resources, and the Metro Manila Development Authority lack the initiative to explore other alternative technologies to properly handle waste, Ferrer said.

“They seem bent on pushing for the incineration of medical wastes when hospitals all over the country have proven that proper waste management is possible without resorting to incineration,” she said.

In 2007, HCWH-SEA, together with the Alternative Budget Initiative for health groups lobbied the national government for a P100-million fund to be part of the DoH 2008 budget for the purchase of autoclaves that will be used to disinfect waste, said Ferrer.

The allocation was approved and included in the 2008 General Appropriations Act but was never released, Ferrer said.

She said the P100 million is a small amount compared to the billions in loans and “investments” that the government continues to shell out to supposedly “bring back incinerators.

Ferrer cited studies that show that 80 percent of hospital waste is regular waste, and treatment technologies are needed only for the remaining 15 to 20 percent that are infectious wastes.

“Proper waste management is our best and only option,” Ferrer said.

Last week, the World Health Organization cited among the reasons for the failure in health care waste management the lack of awareness about the health hazards related to health care waste, inadequate training in proper waste management, absence of waste management and disposal systems, insufficient financial and human resources and the low priority given to the issue.

It added that many countries do not have appropriate regulations or do not enforce them.

“Indeed we have existing policies but strong will is lacking,” Ferrer said. –Macon Ramos-Araneta, Manila Standard Today