A new project is looking to divert more than 600,000 units of contact lens packaging from landfill in six months, as the medical industry looks at new ways to reduce waste.
Key points:
- More than 250 million contacts lens packets enter landfill each year
- The medical industry is searching for ways to effectively recycle its waste
- One advocate says more investment needs to be made by the industry into recycling
Contacts wearers will be able to recycle the blister packaging which holds the lenses, which will be converted to plastic products and aluminium.
The project is being run by National Pharmacies and recycling group Opticycle.
National Pharmacies CEO Vito Borello said an Opticycle study estimated between 250 and 500 million contact lens packages are sent to landfill each year.
"The packs get picked up when the bin that holds the pack is full, then it gets taken away to be repurposed," he said.
"The good news is it doesn't go to landfill it goes to another venue where it gets recycled into plastic and aluminium."
Waste 'one part' of equation
As Australia tries to cut down on its single-use plastic consumption, the medical industry is searching for ways to reduce its own waste.
In the medical and health field, single-use plastics, such as sterile blister packaging, personal protective equipment (PPE) and face masks, are still prevalent and a necessity.
University of New South Wales' recycling expert Professor Veena Sahajwalla said the field is growing but the end products produced need to be high quality.
"No matter at what scale you do it, whether you do it at a local, regional scale, to be able to create materials and create products that are quality and have the performance it's able to meet, is going to be important," she said.
"In the health sector, if that end of life material is something they're keen to see recycled that's only one part of the equation."
Professor Sahajwalla said the pandemic alerted the industry to how much waste it could create.
"On one hand, patient care requires these items that are being used," she said.
"But also we need to ask how we're going to find solutions and be proactively looking for what's already out there."
Investment needed in waste
Mr Borello said organising recycling programs is challenging, given it's an emerging field.
He said greater investment from larger companies and government can help reduce waste in the industry.
"What I will say is it's in everyone's best interests to do the best they can to divert waste from landfill to repurposing like we're doing with this program," he said.
"It's a massive issue and it's not something that one entity on its own can probably do, so I think the more organisations get together and work together the better."
Medical Technology Association of Australia CEO Ian Burgess says there is more to be done when it comes to reducing waste, but the industry is looking to innovate.
"Like other industries, the Australian MedTech industry faces challenges, not only in the environmentally responsible production of medical devices, but also in the life cycle of those devices," he said.
"The scope of the challenge is broad, due to the multiple materials used in device manufacturing, as well as the fact medical device waste is a complex subset of a larger industrial waste problem."