Leslie Lott“Health Care With Harm”: A Study of the Initiative To Shut Down Henry Ford Hospital’s Medical Waste Incinerator inDetroit, MichiganBack To Environmental Justice Case StudiesProblemBack to Table of ContentsDemographicsRecommendationsLeslie Lott“Health Care With Harm”: A Study of the Initiative To Shut Down Henry FordHospital’s Medical Waste Incinerator in Detroit, MichiganTABLE OF CONTENTS Max Ortiz/ Detroit News PROBLEM BACKGROUND KEY ACTORS DEMOGRAPHICS STRATEDGIES SOLUTIONS RECOMMENDATIONS REFERENCESBack To Environmental Justice Case StudiesProblemThe effects of incineration have plagued both Virginia Park, as well as other Detroit residents for years. Wayne County’s reliance on incineration for medical and municipal waste is evident in the locationof three incinerators within an area of less than three miles of each other: Henry Ford Medical Waste Incinerator, Detroit Municipal Incinerator, and Hamtramck Medical Waste Incinerator. Many citizens have referred to this area as Wayne County’s “toxic triangle of incineration”( Pers. Comm. Cedar 2000). The Henry Ford Medical Waste Incinerator is located on the premises of Henry Ford Hospital in a mixed business and residential area on West Grand Boulevard in Detroit, Michigan.Public Health Since the incinerator’s inception in 1980, citizens have made repeated complaints because of foul smells and thick black smoke, which penetrate the Virginia Park neighborhood on a daily basis (Bates-Rudd “Hospital to Close” 1999). The United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) states that medical waste incinerators have been some of Michigan’s largest polluters, for burning waste send tons of lead, dioxins, and other toxins into the atmosphere (http://www.ecocenter.org/health.html). For years, Virginia Park Residents, particularly children and the elderly, have been suffering fromrespiratory illnesses and other related heart conditions(http://www.essential.org/cchw/campaign/Profiles.html). Residents are plagued with nausea and headaches that miraculously disappeared when the incinerator was closed for maintenance reasons in late 1999. David Josar reports that, Michelle Gertz, 44, is becoming increasingly convinced that the incinerator in her neighborhood is not so safe. Her children, Brian 10, and Brittany 8, have chronic headaches and stomachaches which she suspects are caused by the toxins and respiratory irritants that permeate into the environment from the incinerator’s smokestacks (“Incinerator Worries” 1999). “There have been twenty-one recorded deaths related to respiratory and other health problems on Poe Street, located directly across the street from the incinerator” (http://www.essential.org/cchw/campaign/Profiles.html).Environmental JusticeSince the mid- 1980’s it has become increasingly apparent that there is a disproportionate impact of environmental toxins and pollution on individuals who reside in poor and minority communities than those who live in other areas. A study conducted by the United Church of Christ concluded that in communities with two or more commercial hazardous waste facilities, the number of minorities was threetimes higher than in communities without hazardous waste facilities. Environmental racism is the deliberate targeting of people of color communities for toxic waste facilities and the official sanctioning of a life threatening presence of poisons and pollutants in people of color communities (Bryant 2000). Henry Ford Hospital is located in an area where people of color make up ninety-one percent of the population with African-Americans making up the largest number of that percentage (http://www.uscensus.gov). The Henry Ford Health System that operates Henry Ford’s Hospital has two other hospitals in predominately Caucasian suburbs. Currently, these suburban hospitals do not incineratetheir medical waste, but send it to an autoclave in Toledo, Ohio where it is steam sterilized ( Simmons 1999). Donele Wilkens of Detroiters Working For Environmental Justice asserts “Detroit residents are already exposed to more harmful pollutants than their suburban neighbors” (Seigel 1999). To neighbors, community leaders, and environmental groups this is clearly an issue of environmental racism and injustice. However, in January 2000, in response to a letter written by the Coalition to Shut Down HenryFord’s Medical Waste Incinerator, Steve Velick, the Chief Executive Officer of the hospital at the time denied this as being an environmental justice issue. He states “Cottage and Wyandotte [two of the hospitals located in the suburbs] stopped incinerating waste because their facilities did not generate enough waste to justify the costly incinerator upgrades required to meet the EPA’s newest standards” (2000). “Nevertheless, community leaders want to know why the hospital chooses one method in a white, suburban community and a different one in an African-American community” (Holden and Simmons 1999).Role Of Health Care Health care professionals and their institutions pledge to provide services that defend human beings against illness. Furthermore, health systems serve to incorporate vital public health principles in the daily operations of their facilities, including taking an active role in disease prevention (Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition 1999). The Health Care Without Harm Organization(HCWH) explains “ [y]et, unknown to many of us, the purchasing and waste disposal practices of health care institutions oftenundermine their own purpose, and our expectations of them, by contributing to sickness” (HCWH 1999). Further, health professionals have taken the Hippocratic Oath of ‘first, do no harm,’ and practices such as incineration are directly inflicting harm on communities that health care providers claim they strive to protect. Alternatives to IncinerationCommunity leaders maintain that there are affordable, safe and more efficient alternatives that arenow being used by an increasing number of hospitals. However, relying on incineration for the disposal ofmedical waste from hospitals is slowly becoming a rarity in southeast Michigan, particularly Wayne County. In a 1998 survey of twenty-five Wayne County hospitals found that Henry Ford Hospital is the only one still burning their waste in an incinerator on site. One third of these hospitals send their waste a steam based autoclave in