Printable View
This is something I was recently asking myself and I wonder if that's a true story or just an urban legend. It is not something I really like to deal with, but are the crematories selling the old metal implants they find among the ashes? IMHO, I prefer that they go in the scrap metal lane instead of being cleaned and reused on someone else's body, but have you ever had any experience with them?
It's probably an urban legend.
Metal implants ... and even screws ... are stamped with a serial number so that the metal pieces can be traced back to the manufacturer in the even of a medical malpractice lawsuit. Some of the settlements have been in the tens of millions of dollars.
A doctor would have to have rocks in his head to re-use an alloy implant that's been through the fire. They would pull his license and probably throw him in jail.
Why so squeamish abut a few recycled parts, when I was younger had four compound fractures after six months in a cast one fracture would not knit and required a bone graft. I was given the option of cadaver donor or using my using own bone.Quote:
Originally Posted by CopperMiner
I opted for my own and they had removed the bone was removed from my right side hip bone during surgery, spent another six months with a cast on my leg.
As fro recycling metal parts from a cremation I would ask fro a discount.
Dont know about the "left overs" from cremation, but theres a crematory on my dumpster route and they burn the whole casket and throw the burnt up steel hand rails out next to the dumpster for scrap.
I am not squeamish. My mom had a cornea graft from a deceased donor and I used to carry the eye transplants, bags of blood, urns back from the out-of-town crematoria and frozen bovine semen among others that were shipped as bus packages when I was working at the bus depot. I just dislike the idea that they refurbish and clean up the burned implants and resell them to new "customers", but I doubt that they do that (at least here in Canada and U.S.). What am I most curious about is you have dealt, seen or heard about the metal "left overs" going to the yard. I am sure that no one will ever see a hearse dumping stuff on the shred heap, but Greytruck partially answered my question when he mentioned that they throw the casket steel hand rails for scrap. I guess that the implants must follow some kind of a similar route.Quote:
Originally Posted by alloy2
This topic has been addressed on You tube by many bloggers. One being 'Kari the mortician'. She is a full time mortician. She has live events now and then. People can write and ask her questions she will answer live. If I recall right all of the metals are recycled but Kari can clear it all up for you.
Thanks. I knew that Caitlin Doughty answers some question in her mortician videos on Youtube, but not that Kari. I'll watch that.
Not an urban legend. Here from a Canadian refiner's website:
"Specializing in processing high value crematorium material, with the highest recoveries in North America, we are processing experts, from dental scrap to IT equipment and more."
No, they won't resell implants, but the metals are definitely recovered.
Bingo! Very, very interesting. It seems that a discrete niche operation was developed aside from the mainstream recycling/scrap system we all see. Thanks a lot.Quote:
Originally Posted by aurum
Also, I found the following story and it is mentioned that crematorium operators in 30 countries deal with some Netherlands based corporation to have these metals recovered and recycled, then usually give their profits to charities. Only 40 on 1200 operators keep the profits for themselves. https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/crem...dies-1.4623039
By pure randomness and very weird timing, tonight, I was surfing for something else on my smart TV and I found another similar story this time from Belgium. It seems that they also sent their "ultimate products" to the same Netherlands company. It was mentioned that the latter has improved its recovery process and the Brussels location shown in that story made ten years ago 1000 Euros (USD 1100) per year to 14 000 (USD 15400) per year now for their local charities. That's only one location. There's way more money there that I would ever thought.
Haven't been here in a long while. I had hip joints replaced, 1 in 2020, 1 in 2021. Nice to know that the titanium can be recycled when I'm done with them. Maybe end up in high-end golf clubs or one of Musk's spacecraft.