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It is my understanding that some hospital Microbiology laboratories no longer autoclave the biohazard waste they generate and use outside contractors to remove the waste from the hospital. Unless I am mistaken it is treated as red bag waste and packaged in biohazard boxes for disposal (incineration, etc.) offsite. Our laboratory autoclaves our waste because it was our understanding that it had to be rendered "dead" before it left the building. This practice now is being called into question. Have the regulations changed or was our understanding incorrect?
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You probably are doing way too much work by autoclaving all of your biohazard waste (I assume you mean positive cultures). I do not know of any regs which require rendering all organisms "dead" before "red badgging" them.
In my opinion, it is reasonable and prudent to autoclave only positive AFB cultures and positive dimorphic fungal cultures before they are placed in red bags and carried away by contractors. I think most CM labs take this approach.
Larry Gray, PhD, ABMM
Cincinnati, Ohio
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