Red-bag waste - within hospitals all over the world - that means infectious waste - to be handled and disposed of with extreme caution.
That's because the contents, as the name states, include infectious material, which has to be incinerated under strict supervision - to make sure everything is burnt and no traces or stray pieces of waste are left behind.
But - there are reports that - in what seems that in a cost cutting decision - the KHMH - which usually contracts Belize Waste Control to incinerate its infectious waste - has been burning some of its red bag waster at a site off the Boom - Hattieville Road.
Professionals tell us that the practice would seem to be at best questionable because infectious waste is not the kind of thing that one burns on the roadside.
The clue came to us form a photo someone leaked to the media which shows infectious waste stuffed inside a road-ready trailer parked in a corner of the KHMH compound.
At first, we were told that the trailer is only used to pick up infectious waste within the compound.
But today, the Hospital's CEO admitted that when they have what he calls "excess waste" they do burn it themselves:..
Dr. Francis Gary Longsworth - CEO, KHMH
"With regard to waste disposal - medical waste disposal, we do have an arrangement with Belize Waste Control that goes way back and I would say that majority of the times by far they handle 100% of our waste. We do have occasions when we have excess and urgent need to dispose of waste and we do burn our own waste from time to time but that is in minority of cases. When we do so we do so under the strictest public health control and under the supervision of a public health inspector who is brought in when that process needs to take place."
"We are not doing anything irregular or that we should not be doing or have the authority to do because we are doing it properly, we are doing it according to the public health regulations and as I said its only on a need to basis which is very rare."
And while he did not admit that they burn it on the Boom Road - we know that they can't burn it in the KHMH incinerator because that cannot be used within the residential and school area where the KHMH is.
The issue seems to be one of cost cutting since Belize Waste Control charges by the pound for waste incinerated. There is no excess waste for Waste Control - since they can incinerate any volume of waste that the hospital generates.
The KHMH has plans to get its own incinerator at the new regional sanitary landfill - until then we are told - that with this exposure - the red bag burning by the hospital is expected to be discontinued.
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