Enhancing the sustainability and climate resiliency of health care facilities: a comparison of initiatives and toolkits

• Main Authors: John Balbus, Peter Berry, Meagan Brettle, Shalini Jagnarine-Azan, Agnes Soares, Ciro Ugarte, Linda Varangu, Elena Villalobos Prats
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English; Spanish; Portuguese
• Published: Pan American Health Organization
• Subjects: Cambio climático; efectos del clima; prevención y mitigación; planificación en desastres; instituciones de salud; desarrollo sostenible; Américas; Medicine; R; Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine; RC955-962; Public aspects of medicine; RA1-1270; Arctic; Climate change
• Online Access: https://doaj.org/article/67941bcd2f2c459ab399b7c2ed5bf589

ABSTRACT Extreme weather events have revealed the vulnerability of health care facilities and the extent of devastation to the community when they fail. With climate change anticipated to increase extreme weather and its impacts worldwide—severe droughts, floods, heat waves, and related vector-borne diseases—health care officials need to understand and address the vulnerabilities of their health care systems and take action to improve resiliency in ways that also meet sustainability goals. Generally, the health sector is among a country’s largest consumers of energy and a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions. Now it has the opportunity lead climate mitigation, while reducing energy, water, and other costs. This Special Report summarizes several initiatives and compares three toolkits for implementing sustainability and resiliency measures for health care facilities: the Canadian Health Care Facility Climate Change Resiliency Toolkit, the U.S. Sustainable and Climate Resilient Health Care Facilities Toolkit, and the PAHO SMART Hospitals Toolkit of the World Health Organization/Pan American Health Organization. These tools and the lessons learned can provide a critical starting point for any health system in the Americas.