New sustainability standards for international hospitals
In 2023, the IHF’s Geneva Sustainability Centre and Joint Commission International (JCI) agreed to collaborate to develop environmental sustainability standards for international hospitals. These evidence-based standards were published in July 2024, and they form the Global Health Impact chapter of the 8th edition of JCI’s Accreditation Standards for Hospitals.
These new sustainability standards focus on five key areas:
- Governance, tracking, and reporting
- Employee engagement and empowerment
- Use of environmental resources, green operations, and process
- Procurement and supply chain
- Infrastructure and service resilience
The standards will be effective for all JCI-accredited hospitals from January 2025. They include core principles of sustainability that are applicable in most settings. Standards help address shared challenges and create consistency at national and international levels. In this case, they represent an essential step in reducing the carbon footprint of hospitals while also addressing quality and safety.
“The healthcare sector is responsible for up to 6% of global carbon emissions and is also increasingly affected by climate change. Therefore, we are excited to see sustainability standards as one of the major new additions in the JCI 8th edition standards for hospitals and academic medical centres,” says Ronald Lavater, CEO of the IHF.
These standards are being introduced at a crucial time. As the world pays more attention to the costs and impact of healthcare, there is a growing focus on making the industry more sustainable. Through this unique set of new environmental and sustainability standards we aim to help healthcare leaders make sustainability a practical part of their organizations.
