Building a Circular Economy in Cities: What Health Care Facilities Can Learn From Other Sectors

By Beth Rush

For many years, industries followed the simple take-make-dispose model. Although this still dominates many sectors today, you may have noticed how various industries are progressing toward a circular economy. Health care, however, has been slower to move in this direction. Bringing circular economy thinking into health care could improve resource use while also supporting public health and environmental responsibility.

What Is a Circular Economy?

A circular economy keeps materials in use for as long as possible. It encourages you to reuse, repair, refurbish, and recycle, in contrast to the traditional linear model widely used in most modern systems.

In a linear system, materials move in one direction. Resources are taken from the ground, turned into products, and eventually discarded as waste. The circular model interrupts this path by creating loops where materials return to production, so they never leave the system.

Why Health Care Needs to Be Part of the Transition

Health care has been slower to adopt circular economy principles. If you go to a hospital or medical facility, you may see that many still rely heavily on single-use products, disposable packaging, and tightly controlled supply chains.

These practices exist for good reasons. Health care environments require strict infection control, strong regulatory oversight, and high levels of reliability. Patient safety must always come first, and single-use items help reduce contamination risks in many cases.

However, research shows that 85% of health care waste is nonhazardous and could be recycled or managed differently if properly separated. This gap has led to growing interest in circular health care, which applies circular economy principles to health care systems. The goal is to design smarter systems that reduce waste while still maintaining the high standards of health care.

Globally, health care activities account for nearly 5% of carbon dioxide emissions, but adopting circular health care strategies can help reduce this impact. Reusing materials, improving waste management, and designing more efficient supply chains can lower emissions, conserve valuable resources, and support patient well-being.

Circular Strategies Across Different Sectors and What Health Care Can Apply

The following examples may help health care facilities see what is possible and what strategies might translate into medical settings.

Manufacturing and Electronics

Many companies in the manufacturing industry are now redesigning products to keep them useful for longer. Instead of producing items that you can quickly discard, they are creating products that can be repaired, upgraded, or refurbished. In addition, various electronics manufacturers operate product return and trade-in programs. You can send old devices back to the maker, where they’re repaired or disassembled to recover valuable materials.

Some entities also offer service models that let you lease equipment instead of buying. Manufacturers remain responsible for the product, so they have a strong incentive to design durable and repairable equipment.

Since manufacturing medical equipment requires significant resources — including raw materials, water, and energy — applying circular models is important. You can do so by extending the life of medical equipment through maintenance agreements, refurbishment services, and upgrades. Doing so allows hospitals to continue using reliable technology while reducing waste.

Today, refurbishing medical equipment has become an important practice in circular health care. Used devices such as MRI or CT scanners can be cleaned, tested, and restored to manufacturer standards. This process extends the equipment’s life cycle and can cost around 50% less than buying new machines.

Construction and Building Materials

Construction generates significant amounts of waste worldwide. To address this problem, many businesses are adopting circular building strategies. One approach involves recovering materials from demolished buildings.

Builders can reuse steel, glass, bricks, and timber or incorporate recycled materials into new structures so they don’t end up in landfill. Construction teams can also reduce waste by preserving existing structures and salvaging usable materials.

Another strategy involves designing buildings to be taken apart and reused in the future. Modular construction allows you to assemble sections of a structure and later disassemble it without destroying the materials.

You can apply the same thinking when planning new hospitals or renovating existing ones. Health care buildings are complex and often change over time. Designing adaptable spaces and using recyclable materials can reduce waste during facility upgrades. Circular health care in design supports long-term flexibility, as well. Hospitals built with modular systems can expand or adopt new technologies without major demolition.

Food Systems and Hospitality

Given that waste makes up as much as 40% of the global food supply, it’s easy to see why hospitality businesses are quick to adopt circular-economy practices. Various kitchens now monitor food use carefully to reduce waste before it occurs. Plus, some are donating surplus food to community organizations or selling it at reduced prices. You can also find many commercial kitchens composting or using organic waste to produce energy through biogas systems.

Cities have started supporting these efforts, too. For example, San Francisco launched one of the largest food scrap composting programs in the U.S. Since then, the city has collected more than 2 million tons of organic material and turned it into compost used by local farms, orchards, and vineyards.

Hospitals throw away 30% of prepared meals, resulting in financial losses and contributing 5% to 10% of a facility’s carbon dioxide emissions. You can reduce this impact by monitoring portion sizes, tracking food waste, and composting organic material where possible.

Another good strategy to support circular health care goals is food procurement. When you purchase locally produced ingredients, you reduce transportation emissions and strengthen regional supply chains.

Fashion Industry

The fashion industry has also begun rethinking how clothing is produced, used, and discarded. For years, it was known for fast fashion, in which garments were made en masse for a fashion season and discarded when it ended. Many companies are now moving toward circular textile systems.

These focus on extending the life of clothes through reuse, repair, and recycling. Moreover, clothing rental services, resale platforms, and textile recycling programs are becoming more common in many places.

Hospitals rely heavily on disposable gowns, drapes, and other fabric products that medical professionals may discard after single use. Reusable textile systems can help reduce reliance on single-use fabrics.

Surgical gowns, scrubs, and linens made from durable materials can be professionally cleaned, sterilized, and reused many times without compromising safety. Studies have shown that reusable surgical gowns can significantly reduce both waste and environmental impact compared with disposable options.

From Healing Patients to Healing Systems

Health care exists to protect human health, but the systems that support modern medicine also consume large amounts of energy, materials, and resources. Circular health care offers a way to rethink these systems. By keeping materials in use longer, reducing waste, and designing smarter supply chains, health care facilities can lessen their environmental footprints.

About the author: Beth Rush is the green wellness editor at Body+Mind, where she covers topics like the power of climate consciousness at all stages of education. You can find Beth on Twitter @bodymindmag. Subscribe to Body+Mind for more posts by Beth!