Vol. 545 No. 5
50 Mr. Timmins asked the Minister for Health and Children the action which has been taken within the health services to ensure that there will be no further repeat of the two recent cases of illegal dumping of hospital waste. [30928/01]
Healthcare risk waste which is about 20% of all health waste, is disposed of through specialist waste contractors. All healthcare risk waste from publicly funded hospitals is disposed of in this way. These specialist contractors operate to very high standards which are set out in a licence from the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA and they are closely monitored regarding these standards by the EPA. They have a very good record of compliance with their licence conditions. The non-risk waste is disposed of through the municipal or commercial waste disposal route.
Detailed guidance on segregation and packaging of healthcare risk waste has been in circulation to all appropriate public hospitals for some time. Immediately following recent media reports concerning illegal dump sites in Wicklow, the Eastern Regional Health Authority, ERHA, reminded all public hospitals in its area of the continued necessity to comply with these guidelines. The issue of waste management in public hospital is a matter which is taken extremely seriously by hospital authorities and my Department and the ERHA are keeping this matter under review.
