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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Endosc Int Open 2021; 09(11): E1752-E1753
DOI: 10.1055/a-1546-8975
Editorial

Let's urgently engage ourselves in “greening” endoscopy to address ecological issues!

Mathieu Pioche
1   Endoscopy Unit – Digestive Disease Department, Edouard Herriot Hospital, Lyon, France
,
Thomas Lambin
2   Adult Gastroenterology, Lille University Hospital, Lille, France
,
Jérôme Rivory
1   Endoscopy Unit – Digestive Disease Department, Edouard Herriot Hospital, Lyon, France
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Many disciplines have already integrated an ecological dimension into their research projects by, for example, comparing the environmental impact of several given strategies in order to choose the most ecological one [1] [2] [3]. In the field of endoscopy, the introduction of this dimension into our research projects is still in its infancy [4], although our impact on the environment is major. Indeed, we are responsible for many sources of pollution. The amount of waste is much bigger than the simple volume of our devices (stent packaging for example), endoscope disinfection products are polluting, our water consumption is extremely high, rare metals are everywhere in our equipment, and there is talk of introducing disposable endoscopes for which the ecological impact has not yet been assessed [5]. Furthermore, we use animals for our training without any evidence demonstrating the benefits of living models compared to isolated organs.



Publication History

Article published online:
12 November 2021

© 2021. The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

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