Stop Toxic Debt (STD)
Investing in polluting waste disposal systems can cause long-term damage to both the environment, and the economy. Take, for example the case of 26 medical incinerators taking up space in the Philippines.
In 1995, the Philippine Department of Health (DOH), responding to public outcry over the improper disposal of infectious waste, launched a drive to improve the management of waste in all DOH-controlled hospitals
Dubbed "The Austrian project for the establishment of waste disposal facilities and upgrading of the medical equipment standard in DOH hospitals," the project's key component was the purchase of 26 medical waste incinerators called Multizons. The units were supplied to the DOH by VAMED, an Austrian company. And financed by a loan from Bank Austria Aktiengessellschaft.
The incinerators were distributed to various DOH-controlled hospitals nationwide. After a couple of years, the machines failed to improve waste processing, and even attracted complaints from concerned groups. In 1999, the Philippine legislature also passed the Clean Air Act, which banned the incineration of medical waste by 2003.
The DOH, in cooperation with the WHO, subjected the incinerators to a comprehensive emission test, the results of which showed high emissions. In one incinerator tested, dioxin emissions were eight hundred seventy times the limit set by the Clean Air Act.
The machines were shut down by the DOH in 2003, but the country is still allocating roughly US$2 million a year to pay for the loan connected with the failed project. The last payment is due in 2014.
In reaction to this, HCWH-AP is leading the campaign to cancel the Austrian loan connected with the medical waste incinera