Vet Direct – the CVS-owned consumables, equipment and workwear supplier – has launched new soft plastic and medicinal packaging recycling boxes to all veterinary practices within the UK.
Believed to be a first for the industry, the Vet Direct recycling boxes will collect this waste direct from a practice’s doorstep and take it to a UK-based reprocessor. Here it will be recycled it into a plastic replacement for plyboard – to be used within the construction industry.
The veterinary profession is a significant producer of plastic waste. This includes soft plastic – such as sterile packaging and pet food packaging, and medicinal waste – including blister packs and syringes (not classified as pharmaceutical waste. To date some of this soft plastic waste may have been recycled in local facilities, with the remaining previously considered “unrecyclable waste” sent to landfill.
The two Vet Direct recycling boxes will be able to accommodate the widest range of soft plastic and medicinal waste. The soft plastic recycling box will take packets, non-contaminated dry fluid bags, and sterile and pet food packaging. Whilst the medicinal waste recycling box will take needle caps, blister packs, vials, pill bottles and syringes (not classified as pharmaceutical waste). Much of this waste has previously been unrecyclable in domestic, local council and supermarket schemes.
Veterinary practices can order their chosen recycling box from Vet Direct online. In 48 hours, the box will be couriered to the practice. Colleagues will be able to fill their box in their own time, with clean, dry, uncontaminated packaging. When a box becomes full, colleagues simply need to close and seal the box, and contact the reprocessor by email or telephone to arrange courier collection. Each box has a 90 litre capacity, meaning that it should accommodate practice waste over a number of weeks.
Upon collection, The Vet Direct recycling boxes will be sent to the facilities of UK reprocessor MyGroup in Hull, East Yorkshire, who have been recycling for 30 years. Here their contents will be sorted, washed and shredded, and milled into MYboard™ – an extremely versatile replacement for plyboard that can be used indoors and out and which is available in a variety of colours and finishes. This board can also be recycled at the end of its life in a ‘closed loop’.
Anita Bates, commercial director at Vet Direct said: “Every day in every practice around the country our profession will be disposing of plastic waste. Pretty much every veterinary consumable that we use will have some form of plastic packaging.
“Our new Vet Direct recycling boxes turns previously unrecyclable veterinary waste into useful recyclable materials. And we can guarantee that it’s all done here in the UK.
“We are so pleased to be breaking new ground by offering this green service to practices – in order that they can reduce their environmental footprint.”
