Report on Stakeholder Engagement - status report

Digital Health in the Circular Economy (DiCE) aims to develop and demonstrate novel, circular and environmentally sound solutions to design, collect, reuse, refurbish, remanufacture and recycle digital health devices (Digital Display Label, smart wearable sensor, smart pillbox, endocutter, ECG lead sets, On Body Drug Delivery System), which will contribute to enabling a circular transition. Solutions are being implemented, tested and demonstrated in four healthcare ecosystems reflecting the geographical spread within Europe through community engaged pilots in Norway, Belgium, Slovenia, and Spain. DiCE contributes to mitigating the globally expanding health waste problem covering three material streams - electronics, plastics and metal - and alleviate shortage of critical and valuable raw materials, while protecting the health and safety of those involved in realising the circular economy. Exploitation of key outputs will be ensured by all partners throughout and after the project and will be further extended to adjacent sectors through existing networks and platforms within which the partners are represented. The unprecedented global climate change has a catastrophic impact on health, which calls for urgent collective action. Irresponsible management of waste, notably from digital devices, is one of the factors that contributes to climate change. Under the impulse of the digital transformation of healthcare, digital health device use will increase exponentially in the next decade with expected annual global growth rates of almost 20% between 2025 and 20301. The large quantity of medical wearables being placed on the market2 (83 million units in Europe in 2020) will compound the electronics and plastics waste problem. The volumes of electronics and plastics on the market continues to rise with an expected annual growth rate of 4.28%3 and 3.4%4, respectively, by 2028. These materials are found in many digital health devices and only just under 40% of all e-waste5 and 9% of plastic6 waste in the EU is currently being recycled responsibly. Until now, the healthcare industry’s unpreparedness and regulatory barriers delayed efforts to incorporate circular practices in digital health devices production and consumption. Now is the time to proactively start to develop new, circular integrated solutions that tackle the problem of health e-waste and set an example for other industries using digital technologies. Although instruments are currently available for circular economy, a consistent framework as well as detailed guidance for electronics and health devices sectors do not exist. The exploitation of the project’s results will ensure a transition towards a greener digital healthcare and will strengthen the leadership position of the consortium partners for circular economy.