The Global Environmental Facility (GEF)
Together with the World Health Organization and the United Nations Development Program, HCWH-AP is implementing a Global Environment Facility (GEF)-funded initiative.
The project is titled "Demonstrating and Promoting Best Techniques and Practices for Reducing Health Care Waste to Avoid Environmental Releases of Dioxins and Mercury." It has been developed primarily under the GEF to help developing countries meet the objectives of the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants.
The $10 million project will demonstrate dioxin and mercury-free medicine within model health care facilities. The eight participating countries are Argentina, India, Latvia, Lebanon, the Philippines, Senegal, Tanzania, and Vietnam.
The project's overall objective is to reduce the dioxins and mercury being released into the environment by promoting best practices for reducing and managing healthcare waste. We will meet this goal by working with local governments, NGOs, hospitals, clinics, and academics to implement the following:
- Developing model urban and rural hospitals that demonstrate approaches to eliminate dioxin and mercury
- Establishing national training and education programs on health care waste management to serve respective countries and the regions in which they sit
- Assuring that new management practices and systems piloted by the project are nationally documented, promoted, disseminated, replicated, and institutionalized
- Collaborating with Stockholm Convention National Implementation Plan preparation process
- Disseminating and replicating project results regionally and globally