It’s going to cost about $2.5 million to get rid of the remaining asbestos at Lake of the Woods District Hospital.

That’s was one of the line items contained in the hospital’s audited financial statements last month during the hospitals Annual General Meeting.

President and CEO Ray Racette says they are dealing with an old building with lots asbestos still.

“The oldest part of this hospital is almost 100 years old and then we’ve had four additions over time,” explains Racette.

“In those years that those additions were put on, you could use asbestos.  We’ve been living with asbestos for some time.  It’s certainly in all of our buildings on our campus.”

Racette adds that every time they do a renovation, they have to do asbestos removal, so they are getting pretty go at it.

“We have very strict guidelines for asbestos abatement and how we need to do that under standards in order to make sure that the asbestos doesn’t get spread throughout the buildings.  There is a full set of construction and other guidelines on that when you are dealing with asbestos, and we follow that to a tee.”

Racette adds this is the first time the cost of asbestos remediation has been put in their financial statements.