GSS EU Science Funding Gateway

Product development – The project should accelerate the implementation of alternative eco-packaging and device materials through collaborative work by including policy makers, regulators, and standards bodies. It should identify, characterise, and test new replacement materials. The project should examine the European landscape of materials, whether commercially available or under development, which may be acceptable as components of sustainable packaging and appliance solutions, from different perspectives, regulations, possibility to recycle with current and future waste management processes, and sustainability of industrial supply.

Health tech companies are expected to design and develop new packaging and devices (e.g. insulin pens, staplers) by starting from solutions that already exist or are at an advanced stage of development (e.g. available paper-based covers / packaging seals reinforced with polyolefins, or mixtures of virgin and chemically recycled polymers for the manufacture of blisters), and/or by selecting fully compostable or recyclable materials (for example, biomass balanced polymers as currently proposed and under development by chemical companies) to generate innovative packaging and device solutions. The polymers or materials to be selected must not only be recyclable/compostable, but also manufactured with a minimal environmental footprint.

The design and development of the new packaging and devices should apply and adapt circular economy principles and be guided by the SSbD framework.  Interactions between the project and the developers of the SSbD framework at the European Commission.

Recycling – The project should promote the management of waste from packaging and single-use devices (including complex devices) by end users, the healthcare providers, considered as key partners of the project. This should lead to the effective implementation of the sorting and recycling of waste through collaborative work, including technical, organisational, and regulatory aspects (e.g. allowing the reuse of plastics etc. after industrial disinfection and/or decontamination of infectious waste, development of new recycling processes, setting up composting units etc.).

Importantly, the project should extend existing life cycle assessment (LCA) based metrics systems to packaging and devices, by considering the life cycle of the packaging materials, from their manufacturing to their recycling / composting.

The development and implementation of recyclable packaging and device solutions should be articulated by the health tech trade associations, at the European or national levels, in particular with their working groups on sustainability and the circular economy.

The project should as a minimum have all of the following impacts:

• Developers of health products (e.g. drugs, medical devices, in vitro diagnostic reagents, combination devices, etc.) are able to draw general lessons and best practices for their current research, and integrate research results on packaging and devices that generate less waste, make more efficient use of materials, and minimise the use of single-use components.
• Alignment with the European Green Deal objectives for healthcare systems, especially in the field of waste management and CO2 reduction, as well as an improved competitive position for healthcare companies.
• Improving the recyclability of medical devices, independent of whether the material of construction (e.g. plastic, metals) is classified as non-hazardous or infectious waste2.
• Reduced carbon footprint of health products in alignment with the Paris Agreement on climate change and the European Green Deal (55 % by 2030, NetZero by 2050).
• Propose new solutions that are holistic in nature, and which do not create additional adverse ESG (environment, social & governance) issues.
• New solutions should facilitate circularity even if the end points are not a closed loop back into the healthcare sector and instead are used for other applications.
• Identify a range of physical, mechanical, chemical and/or composting recycling infrastructures such that packaging materials and single-use medical devices (e.g. pens used for insulin injection, surgical trocars) can be recycled.