Hospitals deny lacking waste treatment units
Hospitals deny lacking waste treatment units
JAKARTA (JP): Three hospitals denied yesterday reports that
they did not have waste treatment facilities.
The private Ongko Mulyo hospital in Pulomas, North Jakarta
said the hospital had the necessary equipment.
The hospital's maintenance chief, Bambang Estu, questioned the
validity of city authorities' waste samples.
He said that last year waste samples were taken from a flooded
part of the hospital's disposal system.
A representative of the public Fatmawati hospital, South
Jakarta, said it had separate waste treatment units for each of
its divisions but was building a centralized system.
The hospitals were responding to reports they were among 10
hospitals the city had punished for dumping untreated waste into
rivers.
City Environmental Bureau head J.B. Damanik had said only 23
of Jakarta's 98 hospital had standard waste treatment units.
He had that last February the city sealed four hospitals'
disposal pipes and gave written warnings to six others but none
had reported on their progress in building waste treatment
facilities.
The four hospitals to have their pipes sealed were Ongko
Mulyo, Fatmawati, Persahabatan and Halim Perdanakusuma. The
latter two are in East Jakarta.
Gatot Subroto hospital got a written warning. The hospital's
maintenance chief Sunarto said the hospital had six waste
treatment units.
"Our treated waste is always controlled by the agency in
charge of the waste and the sample always meets tolerable
limits," Sunarto said.
But the private Pasar Minggu hospital in South Jakarta said it
did not have waste treatment facilities.
"The apparatus is too expensive, a small hospital like us
can't afford it," a spokeswoman said.
She said the city's health agency's mayoralty office handled
liquid waste.
In 1992 the Ministry of Health issued a decree requiring all
hospitals to have waste management units. The decree gave
hospitals three years to build the units.
In 1995 the governor issued a decree requiring all industries
and hospitals to treat waste before dumping it into rivers.
The Pasar Minggu hospital executive said because the hospital
was among the city's smallest with only 52 beds, the municipality
should handle its waste.
"We would be prepared to pay fees (for the service)," she
said.
Bambang said Ongko Mulyo hospital also hired a firm to manage
its waste.
"The contract with the firm stipulates that if the waste gets
out of control we don't pay them," Bambang said.
He denied the hospital's pipes were ever sealed.
"If they had been sealed, the hospital would have been flooded".
(05)