Problems raised by the management of hospital wastes |
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With more and more medical wastes being found abandoned on the public roads or disposed of on dumps, there has been increasing and quite legitimate concern in recent years about the health risks of this type of waste. The Parliamentary Office has tried to consider the entire "system" for managing these wastes, in order to identify the weak spots as well as the positive aspects. In its study the Office had first to try to separate the subjective reactions and those of the media from the objective risks or hazards. The latter, although tiny from the health standpoint, are in fact exacerbated by the large number of people and organisations involved: large hospitals, small clinics, the liberal professions, the development of care in the community, and so on, all of which complicates the solutions to be applied. It seemed to the Parliamentary Office that "health awareness" still had some progress to make and that in this connection the public hospital should become a model or centre of excellence for public health. The Parliamentary Office nevertheless stressed the fact that all must be involved, including the local authorities; this will have repercussions on the way in which the policies governing medical wastes are funded.
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