The non-existent recycled water barrier one - checks deficient on hospital waste ...

Worth revisiting.

The Australian:

Checks deficient on hospital waste

7 April 2009

Hospital waste in southeast Queensland was to be recycled as drinking water without the necessary approvals in place to ensure the water was not contaminated.

An audit by Queensland Health has found deficiences in the approvals for the disposal of wastes to the sewer in Brisbane's three biggest hospitals. A fourth, Ipswich Hospital, did not have an approval in place for its wastes.

The Queensland Water Commission has repeatedly assured the public that all approvals were operating for the disposal of hospital wastes to the sewer.

The approvals were designed to ensure that contaminants such as blood and cancer chemicals were prevented from being added to the mix to be recycled as drinking water.

The hospital approvals were faulty or non-existent at the time authorities planned to begin pumping recycled water to Brisbane's Wivenhoe Dam in February. The Government deferred the plan after The Australian reported concerns by microbiologists that the seven-stage screening process may not be adequate to prevent contamination.

Premier Anna Bligh confirmed yesterday that the plan would proceed when dam levels dropped to 40 per cent; they are currently at 50 per cent.

The Government refused to release the Queensland Health audit report yesterday. However, a senior Queensland Health source said the audit raised serious concerns about the trade waste approval system at four major hospitals.

The audit covered Ipswich Hospital and, in Brisbane, the Prince Charles Hospital, Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital, and Princess Alexandra Hospital.

"Local councils are supposed to enforce these approvals but that has not been happening," the source said.

"Three hospitals did not have current trade waste contracts in place and one did not even have a trade waste approval.

"With recycled water on the way, this is the state of the management of hospital wastes. Nobody really knows what's being poured down the drains and it's not being monitored in any capacity."

Queensland Water Commission guidelines state that all hospitals must obtain a trade waste approval and have waste management plans in place. The guidelines say the safeguards would ensure contaminants such as unused pharmaceuticals, clinical waste, cytotoxic waste from cancer treatment, and radioactive wastes were disposed of appropriately and did not enter the sewer.

Queensland Health population health director Linda Selvey declined to be interviewed about the audit report but issued a statement to The Australian.

Dr Selvey admitted "shortcomings have been found" with waste approvals at the four hospitals and said action had been taken to deal with the situation.

"Despite some concern raised by the auditors in relation to possible inadequacies in the waste management practices in hospitals, the output from the advanced water treatment plant has consistently tested to be free of contaminants that could have come from hospitals," Dr Selvey said.

See - The Australian - Checks deficient on hospital waste.