Earth Day allows us to reflect upon the opportunities and challenges healthcare faces when dealing with its environmental responsibilities. Will it rise to meet them?

This is Earth Day. It’s when we consider the health of the planet alongside our life on this planet. For healthcare, an environment of its own, the opportunity to bring the messages we embrace on this one day to every day present a design challenge that aligns well with the mission of our health systems. I’d argue its not a nice to have, but a leadership imperative.

Environmental concerns are often hidden from the discussions had in healthcare. After all, much of what we call healthcare is often reactive and focused on restoring people back to health from illness or injury. Yet, it’s also a major contributor to the many causes of ill health through its use of resources and environmental footprint posed by the tools of the trade. To illustrate, let’s look at examples like personal protective equipment (PPE).

The PPE Challenge

Healthcare’s lifesaving personal protective equipment (PPE) carries a hidden environmental cost. From production to disposal, the lifecycle of masks, gloves, and gowns leaves a significant ecological footprint—one that became impossible to ignore during the COVID-19 pandemic. We need PPE, but we also can’t continue to produce single-use material products that continue to create an environmental debt that we will never be able to repay.

Some of the key environmental impacts of PPE include:

Material Concerns – The healthcare industry relies heavily on petroleum-based, single-use PPE that creates substantial waste and contributes to fossil fuel dependency
Waste Crisis – Hospitals generate tons of PPE waste daily, with most ending up in landfills or incinerators rather than recycling streams
Global Ripple Effects – Complex international supply chains multiply transportation emissions while improper disposal leads to pollution in waterways and oceans
Hidden Consequences – Degrading PPE releases microplastics into ecosystems while manufacturing and disposal processes generate greenhouse gases

However, PPE presents us with an opportunity to confront issues of public (and professional) safety, comfort, and environmental impact simultaneously. It is one of the principal design challenges facing health service organizations like hospitals, emergency services, and clinics. Organizations like the Design Council in the UK have refashioned themselves to place planetary sustainability at the core of their mission.

PPE is necessary and since the COVID-19 pandemic, has become a far more visible feature of health systems. This visibility allows for us to better see and appreciate the role(s) that PPE plays and it’s subsequent impact on the environment. It’s just one area where we can make a difference.

Seizing the (Earth) Day

On this Earth Day, consider what might a future without harmful PPE look like? How can we care for healthcare workers and staff and still provide protection in a way that doesn’t harm the planet? Can we transform hospital waste and harm into health and wellbeing for the planet as well as people?

Here are examples of health innovations that are starting to show that we can make a difference on many of the issues of health waste, reuse, and responsible material integration.

Material Innovations

Biodegradable PPE – UK-based Toraphene has developed biodegradable, compostable PPE made from biopolymers that break down naturally after disposal
Plant-Based Alternatives – SHOWA has created Eco Best Technology (EBT) gloves made with plant-based materials that biodegrade in landfills
Compostable Face Masks – Finnish company Sulapac produces masks with sustainable wood-based materials that decompose without releasing microplastics

Reuse & Sterilization Systems

Reusable Isolation Gowns – Healthcare systems like Kaiser Permanente have shifted to washable isolation gowns that can withstand 75+ industrial laundering cycles
N95 Respirator Decontamination – Battelle’s Critical Care Decontamination System uses controlled hydrogen peroxide vapor to safely sterilize N95 masks
UV Sterilization Cabinets – Hospitals implementing UV light sterilization for face shields and certain masks

Waste Management Solutions

Circular Economy Programs – TerraCycle’s Zero Waste Box system collects used PPE for recycling into new products
On-Site Treatment – Cambridge University Hospitals installed Sterimelt technology that compresses and melts polypropylene surgical waste
Chemical Recycling – RMIT University researchers developed methods to break down surgical face masks into road construction materials

Smart Systems

AI-Powered Waste Sorting – AMP Robotics uses artificial intelligence to improve medical waste sorting accuracy
RFID Tracking – Implementation of radio-frequency identification to monitor PPE usage patterns and improve overall logistics movements within healthcare centres and between institutions.

Leading Us To A Healthier Earth

Healthcare is a context that is ripe for leadership on environmental issues. As the health implications of our material use of products becomes more visible, the potential disconnect between what the mission of healthcare is and its outputs and contributions will grow. Further, the embrace of environmental concerns as a priority within the leadership suite of our health institutions provides weight to the need to care for communities proactively and reactively. We can’t simply treat ill health and expect to thrive.

Prevention, early intervention, and the promotion of activities that support health and wellbeing is part of the healthcare mandate. Concepts like social prescribing, which have been gaining attention, include encouraging people to get into nature (natural environments)as part of their wellbeing, mental health and care.

Environmental leadership does not need to exist apart from clinical leadership and health stewardship. This Earth Day, consider how you might lead and how we can design in the earth to our organizations, hospitals, care centres, and communities.

Happy Earth Day.

Photo Credits: Getty (used under license)