What are ‘green hospitals’ that Egypt plans to integrate into health system?

CAIRO – 2 July 2022: The world is currently in a green transition, through using green technology and creating sustainable industry and transport while maintain an environment-friendly manner.

The term “green hospitals” began to be used a lot as part of the integrated system that Egypt seeks to implement in its green transition.

A green hospital can be defined as utilizing natural resources in an efficient manner while enhancing patients’ wellbeing. A green hospital is consuming less energy, conserving water, looking for greener waste disposal methods and considering chemical safety.

In this article, we will define what is a green hospital, and what procedures are taken at a hospital to be considered green:

1- Green hospitals is a term given to environment-friendly hospitals, where they are considered to be less harmful to the environment and less consuming of environmental resources.

2- Green hospitals are a concept that emerged recently after studies that confirmed that hospitals are buildings that strongly affect the surrounding environment.

3- Green hospitals consume less energy (lighting, operating equipment, air conditioning and water heating).

4- Green hospitals are among the buildings that have the least medical or non-medical waste, and the volume of carbon emissions is also significantly lower.

5- Studies have shown that an average hospital consumes 5,000 liters of water per day.

6- Green hospitals integrate green designs and concepts into the process of building and equipping the hospital construction, in order to reduce the negative impact on the environment.

7- Green hospitals are those that take into account reducing operating costs and increasing energy efficiency.

8- Issuing a code for the establishment of Egyptian hospitals that includes all these applications, and in the fourth part of the Egyptian Hospital Code, all newly designed hospitals have been obligated to apply these concepts since 2019.