Environmental Impact of Telehealth Use for Pediatric Surgery

The United States’ (US) healthcare system plays a significant and injurious role in climate change. Greenhouse gas emissions from the US healthcare sector account for 10% of the national total [1]. Between 2010 and 2018, US healthcare emissions rose 6%, reaching 3,730 pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) per capita [2]. This is the highest rate among all industrialized economies [2,3]. It has been estimated that US healthcare emissions now result in 470,000 disability-adjusted life years lost annually, which is comparable to the number of deaths from preventable medical errors [1,3].