It’s a different story for cremation. In a furnace, silicone may burn up, but not the metal in implants – such as titanium or cobalt alloy. It is often separated from the ash and disposed of separately. Even tiny amounts of precious metals such as gold fillings can be discovered by waving a metal-detector over the ashes.
In recent years, enterprising organisations have stepped in to recycle this material. Dutch company Orthometals, for example, collects 250 tonnes of metal every year from hundreds of crematoriums around Europe. At their facility in Steenbergen, it is sorted and melted down into ingots before being sold to the automobile and aeronautical industries. A similar US company, Implant Recycling, sells the melted and recast metals back into the medical industry. After you die, a little piece of you may one day end up in an aeroplane, a wind turbine, or even another person.
Pacemakers and ICDs, by contrast, are often taken out of the body after death – and almost always before cremation, because the batteries can explode when heated. The same goes for spinal cord stimulators that treat pain and some types of internal pumps for administering drugs, since they contain electronics too.
Once removed, implants are typically discarded – both the European Union and the US, among others, have rules that forbid the reuse of implanted medical devices. However, there is a growing trend to recover them for use in the developing world.
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