Officials eye ways to stop dumping of medical waste

By Linwood Outlaw -- loutlaw@nvdaily.com

FRONT ROYAL -- Bags containing hazardous medical waste have been "unlawfully" disposed of at the Warren County Solid Waste Transfer Station, and the problem needs to be curbed before it creates serious safety risks, officials said Friday.

In the past several months, the transfer station in Bentonville has received a number of empty red bags labeled "Bio-Hazard/Medical Waste," Deputy County Administrator Richard J. Magnifico said.

On Thursday, however, a red bag containing "what we believe is hazardous medical waste materials" was found at the station, Magnifico said. Another red bag filled with such materials and a sealed medical sharps container labeled "Bio-Hazard" was found at the transfer station on Friday.

It was not immediately known who is disposing of the materials at the station, Magnifico said.

"You can't waste a lot of time on an empty, unused bag. So, we didn't get too upset about the past issue. Once the bags came in with contents, that's a different story," Magnifico said in a phone interview on Friday afternoon. "What we've done is asked our hazardous waste team through the fire department to come and examine and open the bags and see if they can find any information contained within the bag that would identify its source. Another thing that we're doing is trying to examine the waste that comes in from the different contractors that pick up waste at medical facilities."

In some cases, transportation of regulated medical waste by medical personnel requires no prior certification to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality. However, commercial operators must file certification that their businesses meet requirements before accepting infectious material for transport, according to DEQ's official Web site.

The county's transfer station is not allowed by state code to accept hazardous medical waste, and officials are concerned about its staff potentially being exposed to waste materials. They are also concerned about such materials spilling over into the daily waste stream.

"If somebody throws needles into a bag, and didn't put them into any type of restrictive container, if they went to remove the bag, they might get stuck by the needle, and not know what the needle was," Magnifico said. "We want to protect the staff here."

The county collects between 80 to 90 tons of waste per day, and "trying to identify and remove one bag is an enormous and unsafe task," according to a memo sent out by Magnifico. "The medical facilities who are contributing this bio-hazardous waste are functioning both unlawfully and unethically in their waste disposition," the memo says.

Representatives of the Virginia Department of Health, Warren Memorial Hospital and Department of Environmental Quality have been invited to a work session Wednesday at 2 p.m. in the community meeting room at the Warren County Government Center to discuss how to spread the word about properly disposing of medical waste.

"I'm trying to get a message out not only to the businesses, but to the public. A lot of people use needles, and there is a safe way of disposing of needles," Magnifico said.

PRESS RELEASE: Statement from Town and Gown Players

ATHENS (MyFOX ATLANTA) - The three people we lost yesterday were a part of the rich 50-year history of this theater and, more than that, were vital members of the Town and Gown family.

Ben Teague, loving husband of UGA's Dr. Fran Teague for more than 40 years, was not only a friend but also a father figure to all at the theater. One would be hard pressed to find a Town and Gowner who had not learned at least one life lesson from this wise and kind hearted man. His wife wishes to say, "Yesterday Ben was murdered, which is hard to comprehend and impossible to accept. It was a beautiful day, however, and he was in his favorite place with the people he loved." Ben was a translator of German, Russian and English.

Marie Bruce was the binding force that held the Town and Gown community together. Having worked with Town and Gown for over 20 years, at one time or another she served in every capacity at the theater, artistically and administratively, from leading lady to president of the board to chief cook and bottle washer. A local attorney, Marie was the mother of two young children.

A gentle presence, Tom Tanner breathed life into every corner of Town and Gown through his quiet diligence and astounding creativity - most would call him genius. Father of an equally amazing daughter, Tom would tell you that while he enjoyed his work as director of the Regional Dynamics Economic Modeling Laboratory at Clemson University, his heart lived and thrived in the theater.

Ben, Marie and Tom were a part of our family, and as painful as their loss is for us, we know it is even more painful for their families. We want to extend our deepest sympathy to their immediate family and close friends outside the theater community. There are no words we can use to adequately express our grief.

We would like to thank the Athens Police department and the media for their respectful treatment of this tragedy. We want to thank the American Bio Recovery Association and A1 BIO-Clean Service for the generous donation of their services in our time of need. We also want to thank the Athens Community for their support. This tragedy effects everyone in the community in some way, and we know you share in our loss. We ask that the media continue to be respectful of our privacy during this difficult time.

Custodian’s stress-disorder suit restored

Meghann M. Cuniff / Staff writer

A custodian who sued her school district after being forced to clean up the bloody scene of a student’s suicide had her lawsuit reinstated Tuesday by the Washington Court of Appeals.

Debbie Rothwell, who still works at Lakeside High School in Nine Mile Falls, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, according to a lawsuit filed in May 2007 by her lawyer, William Powell, of Spokane. The 16-year-old student shot himself in the head inside the school’s main entrance in 2004. The lawsuit was dismissed in January 2008 by Spokane County Superior Court Judge Greg Sypolt, who ruled the incident was covered by the Industrial Insurance Act.

But the Court of Appeals, in a 2-1 ruling, disagreed and reinstated the suit.

“There are people who do clean up the mess after one of these horrible murders or suicides happen,” Powell said Tuesday, referring to private professionals. “But the superintendent in this case chose not to do that. He should have known better.”

Along with former Superintendent Michael Green, now superintendent of the Woodland School District in Western Washington, the lawsuit names the Nine Miles Falls School District, Stevens County Sheriff Craig Thayer, two sheriff’s detectives and an unidentified man as defendants.

None was available for comment. Like most civil suits in Washington, the complaint seeks unspecified damages.

Rothwell’s complaints center around her task of cleaning up the suicide scene, then being asked to move a backpack she later learned belonged to the victim and contained a suspicious device that authorities detonated using a robot.

She stayed at work until after 4 a.m., cleaning the mess of blood, brain and bone alone, becoming “emotionally distraught and physically ill” before returning to the school less than four hours later at Green’s orders to serve cookies and coffee to grieving students and keep the media from the school, according to the suit.

At issue in the court decisions was whether Rothwell’s claim of post-traumatic stress disorder fell under the industrial injury act, which prohibits lawsuits based on industry injury or occupational disease.

Judges John A. Schultheis and Dennis J. Sweeney ruled it didn’t because it wasn’t the result of one work order. Her trauma grew over several days, according to their written opinion. Judge Teresa C. Kulik dissented.

Cleanup completed at Civic Association

April 5, 2009

Cleanup has been completed at the American Civic Association building in Binghamton, where a gunman killed 13 people and injured four before taking his own life Friday.

The American Bio-Recovery Association, a non-profit international association of crime and trauma scene professionals, said Sunday that the bio-recovery cleaning was complete. The Ipswich, Mass.-based group provided the service at no cost.

Two member companies, Disaster Clean Up of Endwell and the Bio-Recovery Corporation of New York City, donated labor and supplies to remediate the scene with a crew of six technicians.

Bio-Recovery Corporation Aids In Binghamton Crime Scene Cleanup

PRESS RELEASE
April 5th 2009

Bio-Recovery Corporation of New York City and Diaster Scene Cleanup of Endwell, NY responded to the American Civic Association on April 5th 2009 at the request of the American Bio-Recovery Association to aid the American Civic Association and the entire Binghamton community with the cleanup of the crime scene left in the aftermath of Fridays multiple homicide, suicide at their offices located at 131 Front St Binghamton, NY.

At the request of Dale Cillian, President of the non profit American Bio-Recovery Association (ABRA), the two named companies above provided all the labor and equipment to complete this cleanup in one day at no cost to the American Civic Association. "I couldn't have done this without you guys," stated Andrew Baranoski, Executive Director of the non-profit American Civic Association.

The American Bio Recovery Association, an international association of Crime & Trauma Scene Cleanup professionals strives to make these services available to all that require it throughout the United States.

Southwest Virginia Company Vows To Help Families When Tragedy Strikes

By Bill Christian
Anchor / Reporter / WJHL

Wes Price and his Father in-law, Kenny Lyles run a part-time business, but the services they offer are anything but ordinary. Mountain Empire Bio-Recovery specializes in murder scene and suicide cleanup.

“We just look at it as a service to help out the families where they can try and go on as possible,“ said Wes Price, Mountain Empire Bio-Recovery Inc.
According to police, once a murder investigation is over, the property is turned back over to the family.

“You go in with the attitude that you are foremost, helping the families,“ said Kenny Lyles, co-owner.

He and his son in-law came up with a plan to start the business about five years ago. They were spurred into action a few years later when a neighbor was murdered and the family was forced to deal with the aftermath.
“We vowed then that no families would ever have to deal with having to cleanup a scene like that,“ Price said.

No matter why they do it, their new profession is obviously not for everyone.
“You have to have a strong stomach, but really you have to have a stronger mind,” said Price.

He also said they realize their services are not something that people want to think about, but they are ready to jump into action at a moments notice to help families get through a tough time.

Mountain Empire Bio-Recovery is based in Marion, Virginia and also specializes in several types of ordor removal. They can be reached at 276-646-8632 or 276-759-7926.

Offering service to aid people in some of life’s most difficult moments

By DAN KEGLEY/Staff

Funeral directors understand the quandary facing new business owners Kenny Lyles and son-in-law Wes Price of Chilhowie, but even undertakers have an easier time of marketing their services. After all, everyone will need their help sometime. Death is, of course, inevitable and solicitation of end-of-life accommodations is almost equally so.

It’s the means of death or serious injury that creates both the need for Lyles and Price’s service and their difficulty in offering it. As Lyles said this week, they’re in a Catch 22, stuck between a rock and a hard place.
At considerable investment of time and personal expense, they have become trained and certified to offer a humanitarian service few people will ever need and none want to think about until they need it.

This fall, they started Mountain Empire Bio-Recovery Inc. They are technicians trained in cleaning up what can be a considerable amount of human bodily fluid, bone and tissue and residual contamination where murders, suicides, unattended deaths, and even non-fatal but bloody injuries and accidents happen.

For family members faced with these situations, especially fatalities, cleaning up after them can add levels of abhorrent trauma on top of the loss itself.
Sometimes good can come from tragedy, and the community has sought long and hard for any good to be found in a violent murder of a family in Seven Mile Ford three years ago. Lyles and Price got the inspiration for their service after a man shot to death a couple and their young child in 2005.

“After the scene was released by the investigators it was left for the family and there was no one to clean it up,” Price said in a recent e-mail. “We vowed then that no family should be left with the horrifying task of cleaning up a scene like that and have devoted our time to become trained in the bio-recovery field.”
Price said he and Lyles researched and found a school teaching bio-recovery in South Carolina and learned there how complex a task it can be.

“We thought we’d take a bucket of water and some bleach and that would be it,” Price said.

Not even close. Organic matter soon deactivates bleach, Lyles said, rendering a mop bucket full of water impotent to disinfect and creating instead a new means of spreading contamination.

And there can be plenty of that. Many disease organisms can survive in suspended animation outside the body for long periods, awaiting reintroduction into a new host. Price said while the floor can look clean, it can harbor viruses that can transfer to children’s toys, for example, and then to children who put the toys in their mouths. More directly, small children often put their mouths directly on floors.

Lyles and Price got a real education in infectious disease management and decontamination technology to go with their certification by the National Institute of Decontamination Specialists and the American Bio-recovery Association. They gained OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) compliance in standards for handling bloodborne pathogens, hazard communications, respiratory protection, industrial site lockout/tagout procedure, and confined space operations.
Those last two items enable them to respond to work sites where bad things happen to people using machines.

OSHA is serious about making sure people know how to handle bloodborne pathogens, imposing fines as high as $70,000 for violations of standards of the OSHA regulation whose number Price can recite without effort: “29CFR1910:1030.”
“We learned a lot,” Lyles said.

What they learned, they said, made obvious that carpet cleaning services probably are not addressing the full scope of contamination when they respond to accident and death scenes.

“A thumbnail-size spot of blood will contaminate a two-foot wide area under the carpet,” Price said, necessitating carpet removal and direct cleaning of the surface below.

He and Lyles can handle that as well as a much more involved scenario that is tough to merely read about, the contamination potential of body that goes undiscovered. “Fluids from an unattended death in two weeks can seep through the floor to the ground,” Price said.

Among its many steps, decontamination involves ensuring the environment at clean-up is identical to its state when the trauma occurred. For example, Price said, the temperature need to be the same. If it is colder, pores in surfaces close, trapping molecules of substances that can later emit odors. Even the ozone machine they employ can’t reach into closed pores, he said.
Police are highly protective of crime scenes until investigators can glean from the physical evidence all they need. After that, the scene is released to the family, or to the business if the event happens in the workplace. In that instance, too many managers have employees just mop up, a practice that is unlikely to disinfect the scene.

Families should not have to deal with that aspect of a death, Lyles and Price believe.

“People have to go on with making funeral arrangements,” Price said. “They can turn [cleanup] over to us. We can get in as soon as it is released.”
Their training involved hand-on exercises. One scenario presented a suicide by shotgun, another a stabbing. Hog blood and organs were reasonable facsimiles for their human counterparts in what instructors told them was a pretty realistic presentation of what the students would encounter in practice.
Lyles and Price incorporated their business Aug. 1 and are awaiting their first call to service, and that’s how they view it. Despite a collective investment of some $14,000 in education and equipment, they’ll operate much as rescue squads do. Mountain Empire Bio-Recovery will bill homeowners’ insurance they say covers their work.

“Ninety-nine percent of the time it is not coming out of the homeowner’s pocket,” Price said. They’ll even handle the billing.

However, payment is not a consideration, they said. They’ll work for the uninsured and those unable to pay just the same as for the insured.
Lyles and Price’s marketing quandary involves their desire to remain tactful in promoting a service for needs that remain largely unthinkable. No one expects to face cleanup after violence or accidents.

“We understand that our business is one that is not the type that you can make flyers and use for advertising, but there is a need for these services and families are not aware that they are available,” Price said.

The men are directly contacting law enforcement agencies in Southwest Virginia and Northeast Tennessee, and plan to make connections with rescue squads and other first responders.