455B.501 Regulation of infectious waste.

1. As used in this section, unless the context otherwise requires:

a. “Contaminated animal carcasses” means waste including carcasses, body parts, and bedding of animals that were exposed to infectious agents during research, production of biologicals, or testing of pharmaceuticals.

b. “Contaminated sharps” means all discarded sharp items derived from patient care in medical, research, or industrial facilities including glass vials containing materials defined as infectious, hypodermic needles, scalpel blades, and pasteur pipettes.

c. “Cultures and stocks of infectious agents” means specimen cultures collected from medical and pathological laboratories, cultures and stocks of infectious agents from research and industrial laboratories, wastes from the production of biological agents, discarded live and attenuated vaccines, and culture dishes and devices used to transfer, inoculate, or mix cultures.

d. “Human blood and blood products” means human serum, plasma, other blood components, bulk blood, or containerized blood in quantities greater than twenty milliliters.

e. “Infectious” means containing pathogens with sufficient virulence and quantity so that exposure to an infectious agent by a susceptible host could result in an infectious disease when the infectious agent is improperly treated, stored, transplanted, or disposed.

f. “Infectious waste” means waste, which is infectious, including but not limited to contaminated sharps, cultures, and stocks of infectious agents, blood and blood products, pathological waste, and contaminated animal carcasses from hospitals or research laboratories.

g. “Pathological waste” means human tissues and body parts that are removed during surgery or autopsy.

2. The department shall recommend, for adoption by the commission, standards for on-site and off-site treatment of infectious waste. In developing standards, the department shall consider factors affecting the feasibility of alternative methods of treatment and disposal, including but not limited to the volume of infectious waste generated, the availability of treatment facilities within geographic areas, and the costs of transporting infectious wastes to treatment facilities. The standards shall include monitoring requirements for treatment facilities and training requirements for operators of facilities. The standards may include requirements for management plans dealing with the plans for management of infectious wastes in compliance with adopted standards. In cases in which an individual generator of infectious waste is served by a person treating or disposing of the infectious waste, the person treating or disposing of the waste may prepare the plan for all generators served.

89 Acts, ch 245, §1; 99 Acts, ch 46, §1

Local approval of infectious waste incinerator projects; §455B.305A