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Environmentally sustainable and climate neutral health and care systems
Funding Program | Horizon Europe - Cluster 1 - Destination 4: Ensuring access to innovative, sustainable and high-quality health care | |
Call number | HORIZON-HLTH-2023-CARE-04-03 | |
deadlines | Opening 12.01.2023 | Deadline 13.04.2023 17:00 |
date - 2nd stage | Opening 31.01.2023 | |
Funding rate | 100% | |
Call budget | € 20,000,000.00 | |
Estimated EU contribution per project | between € 4,000,000.00 and € 6,000,000.00 | |
Link to the call | ec.europa.eu | |
Link to the submission | ec.europa.eu |
Call content
Call objectives | The health care sector is responsible for 4-5% of global total carbon emissions, and generates significant demands for energy and materials, as well as dangerous waste streams that may cause air, soil and water pollution. At the same time, health and care provision generally experiences less pressure to decarbonise and improve its circularity than other sectors of the economy. With the European Green Deal, the EU commits to reducing net greenhouse gas emission by at least 55% by 2030, and to reach no net emissions by 2050, and the health and care systems are not exempt. Research and innovation can support by ensuring a smooth transformation while maintaining or improving quality of health and care services. Health and care systems are undergoing structural changes, for example by strengthening primary care and community-based care, strengthening digitalisation and making sure patients are treated or cared for at the most efficient level. This offers the possibility to connect structural changes with an environmental transformation. During COP26, 18 countries (including two EU Member States) have committed to cutting all carbon emissions from their health systems over the next 10 to 30 years and during the same period in total fifty countries (including six EU Member States) have committed to creating climate resilient, low carbon, sustainable health systems. In February 2022, the WHO published a report on the waste that had been generated as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, even more emphasising the need to improve waste management systems of the health and care systems. The report states that 30% of healthcare facilities word-wide, and 60% in the least developed countries, are not fit to handle the waste generated even when not taking the extra waste generated by the pandemic into account. Not only does this pose environmental risks such as water and air pollution, but it also poses a risk to health workers’ safety by increasing the risk of being exposed to stick injuries, burns and pathogenic microorganisms. Research and innovation activities under this topic should be specific to health and care sectors. They should include cost studies when relevant (environmental impacts and benefits to be quantified through the life cycle thinking approach (e.g. LCA/SLCA), to be effectively implemented in line with the European Green Deal and the Zero Pollution Action Plan) and piloting research results onsite in hospitals or other care settings while generating accessible knowledge could be included. Apart from that, successful proposals should address several of the following:
Projects with interdisciplinary teams representing the health and care sectors, and the environmental sector or other relevant sectors are welcome. This topic requires the effective contribution of social sciences and humanities (SSH) disciplines and the involvement of SSH experts, institutions as well as the inclusion of relevant SSH expertise, in order to produce meaningful and significant effects enhancing the societal impact of the related research activities. All projects funded under this topic are strongly encouraged to participate in networking and joint activities, as appropriate. Therefore, proposals should include a budget for the attendance to regular joint meetings and may consider covering the costs of any other potential joint activities without the prerequisite to detail concrete joint activities at this stage. The details of these joint activities will be defined during the grant agreement preparation phase. Applicants are encouraged to consider how their proposals can contribute in the context of the European Green Deal, and to take into account the principles of the Circular Economy Action Plan, the Zero Pollution Action Plan as well as the Technical guidance on the climate proofing of infrastructure in the period 2021-2027. Applicants envisaging to include clinical studies should provide details of their clinical studies in the dedicated annex using the template provided in the submission system. See definition of clinical studies in the introduction to this work programme part. read more |
Expected effects and impacts | |
Expected results |
read more |
Regions / countries for funding | EU Member States, Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT) Moldova (Moldova), Albania (Shqipëria), Armenia (Հայաստան), Bosnia and Herzegovina (Bosna i Hercegovina / Босна и Херцеговина), Faeroes (Føroyar / Færøerne), Georgia (საქართველო), Island (Ísland), Israel (ישראל / إِسْرَائِيل), Kosovo (Kosova/Kosovë / Косово), Montenegro (Црна Гора), Morocco (المغرب), North Macedonia (Северна Македонија), Norway (Norge), Serbia (Srbija/Сpбија), Tunisia (تونس /Tūnis), Türkiye, Ukraine (Україна), United Kingdom |
eligible entities | EU Body, Education and training institution, International organization, Natural Person, Non-Profit Organisation (NPO) / Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), Other, Private institution, incl. private company (private for profit), Public Body (national, regional and local; incl. EGTCs), Research Institution incl. University, Small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) |
Mandatory partnership | Yes |
Project Partnership | To be eligible for funding, applicants must be established in one of the following countries:
Applications may be submitted by one or more legal entities, which may be established in a Member State, Associated Country or, in exceptional cases and if provided for in the specific call conditions, in another third country. In recognition of the opening of the US National Institutes of Health’s programmes to European researchers, any legal entity established in the United States of America is eligible to receive Union funding. Any legal entity, regardless of its place of establishment, including legal entities from non-associated third countries or international organisations (including international European research organisations) is eligible to participate (whether it is eligible for funding or not), provided that the conditions laid down in the Horizon Europe Regulation have been met, along with any other conditions laid down in the specific call topic. A ‘legal entity’ means any natural or legal person created and recognised as such under national law, EU law or international law, which has legal personality and which may, acting in its own name, exercise rights and be subject to obligations, or an entity without legal personality. Specific cases:
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Additional information
Topics |
Administration & Governance, Institutional Capacity & Cooperation, Air Quality, Biodiversity & Environment, Climate & Climate Change, Water quality & management, Health, Social Services, Sports |
Relevance for EU Macro-Region | EUSAIR - EU Strategy for the Adriatic and Ionian Region, EUSALP - EU Strategy for the Alpine Space, EUSBSR - EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region, EUSDR - EU Strategy for the Danube Region |
UN Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs) |
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Additional Information | All proposals must be submitted electronically via the Funders & Tenders Portal electronic submission system (accessible via the topic page in the Search Funding & Tenders section). Paper submissions are NOT possible. Proposals must be complete and contain all parts and mandatory annexes and supporting documents, e.g. plan for the exploitation and dissemination of the results including communication activities, etc. The application form will have two parts:
Annexes and supporting documents will be directly available in the submission system and must be uploaded as PDF files (or other formats allowed by the system). The limit for a full application (Part B) is 45 pages. The award criteria are described in General Annex D. The following exceptions apply: The thresholds for each criterion will be 4 (Excellence), 4 (Impact) and 3 (Implementation). The cumulative threshold will be 12. |
Call documents | HE-Work Programme 2023-2024, Cluster 1, Destination 4 (379kB) |
Contact | National Contact Points for Horizon Europe Website |
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