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The Arizona Republic 11/30/02
See Also: 11/26/02 Breaking News! Tribal Members & Greenaction Win Victory! Stericycle Closes Controversial Waste Incinerator at Gila River Indian Community reservation in Arizona! For more information about the victory against the IES incinerators in California IES Campaign Home Page For more information about the campaign for responsible health care, visit Health Care Without Harm's website at www.noharm.org Read Industry Journal Report on Protest & Press Conference at Stericycle Shareholder Meeting Read the Health Care Without Harm report on Stericycle Inc and press coverage of the report in Solid Waste Report 5/15/02 Chicago: Stericycle Shareholders Meeting! Greenaction and Health Care Without Harm Challenge Medical Waste Company to End Incineration. Read the Message To Shareholders, and read the Health Care Without Harm report on Stericycle. 12/13/01 The fight for jobs and environmental justice: Lessons and next steps in the campaign against the IES incinerators
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Firm quits incineration of medical garbage Mary Jo Pitzl A company on the Valley's southern edge has stopped burning medical waste, bringing cheers from environmental activists and the Gila River Indian Community. Stericycle Inc. shut down its incinerator in midmonth and switched to a cleaner technology, said Lori Thomas-Luna, a Gila River tribal member who organized a group to pressure the company to stop the long-standing practice. "It was a long, hard fight," Thomas-Luna said. "We said we don't want any emissions on the reservation." The emissions weren't confined to the Gila River Reservation. The incinerator is in the tribe's Lone Butte business park on the northern edge of the reservation. It sits less than half a mile from the tribe's Lone Butte casino and adjacent to Chandler and Ahwatukee neighborhoods. A local Stericycle employee would not comment on operations Friday, and referred all calls to the company's media office in Sun Valley, Calif. Calls to that number were not returned Friday. Stericycle has operated the incinerator for about a decade. It burned medical waste collected from area hospitals, medical and dental offices, mortuaries and research institutes. When its lease came up for renegotiation, activists saw an opening to press their case for shutting down the incinerator. "It's a huge, huge victory," said Teri Johnson, Arizona community organizer for Greenaction, an environmental-activist group that worked with tribal members. Medical waste can generate harmful toxics when burned. For example, products that contain chlorine-based chemicals produce dioxin when burned. Dioxin, even in small quantities, has been linked to a host of ills, including cancer, birth defects, diabetes and infertility. Mercury was another worrisome byproduct, Johnson said. Stericycle uses a steam-driven method for sterilizing non-medical waste and will now treat medical waste the same way, Thomas-Luna said. Thomas-Luna said tribal environmental officials told her that the incinerator is scheduled to be dismantled next week. Copyright 2002, The Arizona Republic. |
