This technical brief offers a concise overview of the essential components for planning, implementing, and enforcing a National Healthcare Waste Management (HCWM) Strategy with costed roadmap. The safe and environmentally friendly management of waste from the health sector is part of the broader effort to build safe, climate-resilient, affordable and environmentally sustainable health care facilities (HCFs). The development, resourcing and implementation of costed roadmaps and programmes in the area of HCWM, in line with economic realities and integrated with national health, Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) and other relevant financing efforts, is a declared aim of the WHO UNICEF Global Framework for Action1 2024–2030 (UNICEF/WHO 2024). It aligns with the relevant UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),2 the One Health3 approach andinternational Conventions like the Stockholm, Basel and Minamata Convention. Furthermore, it provides an operational roadmap for implementingthe 2023 United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on WASH, waste and electricity in health care facilities (UNGA, 2023).4The generation of waste from health facilities is a growing global concern posing risks for humans, animals and the environment. Non-hazardous andhazardous health care waste categories like infectious, sharp, pathological, pharmaceutical, chemical and radioactive waste must be considered duringthe development of National HCWM Strategies
Fundamental infrastructure and Management
| Title | Author | Year | Type | Language |
| Decommissioning and safe disposal of cold chain equipment | UNICEF, World Health Organization (WHO) | 2018 | Guidance | English |
| Cold chain equipment and dry store temperature mapping tool | World Health Organization (WHO) | 2021 | Tool | English |
| How to temperature map cold chain equipment and storage areas, 2nd ed | World Health Organization (WHO) | 2022 | Tool | English |
| Cold Chain Temperature Data Job Aid | JSI, PATH, VillageReach, New Horizons | 2025 | Guidance | English |
| Total Cost of Ownership Tool for Cold Chain Equipment | PATH | 2016 | Tool | English |
| Cold chain equipment inventory guidelines: Improving the quality and accuracy of national cold chain equipment inventory data | VillageReach, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, PATH | 2020 | Guidance | English, French |
| Guidance on selecting, commissioning and using freeze-preventative vaccine carriers | World Health Organization (WHO) | 2021 | Guidance | Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish |
| Using freeze-preventive cold boxes in rural Nepal: A study of equipment performance, acceptability, system fit, and cost | Sandeep Kumar, Pat Lennon, Surendra Uranw | 2024 | Journal article | English |
| Evaluating potential program cost savings with a single-dose HPV vaccination schedule: a modeling study. | Rose Slavkosky, Mercy Mvundura, Frédéric Debellut, Teddy Naddumba | 2024 | Journal article | English |
| Temperature monitoring study: a fully documented process to detect weaknesses in the supply chain | World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF | 2018 | Guidance | English |
| Guidance on sustainable health-care waste management | Michelle Seidel, Ranjit Dhiman, Terry Hart | 2023 | Guidance | English |
| Guidance on the selection of green and safe healthcare waste treatment technology | Ridwan Gustiana, Isabelle Cantin, Ranjit Dhiman, Sophie De Fries, Martin Bjerregaard, Lindsay Marie Denny | 2025 | Guidance | English |
| NATIONAL HEALTH CARE WASTE MANAGEMENT STRATEGY | Ranjit Dhiman, Ute Pieper, Michelle Seidel | 2025 | Guidance | English |
| Health-Care facility Solar Electrification for Climate-Resilient and Environmentally Sustainable Health-Care Facilities | Terry Hart, Ranjit Dhiman, Michelle Seidel | 2023 | Guidance | English |