I received some communication (see below post) from a company that sells sustainable baby wipes (I have no conflict of interest with the company).
Just wondering if there have been pieces of work looking into current wipes used in the NHS. I'm doing some digging locally, but wondered about nationally what people are doing?
Cost = £29.99 ( £35.99 Inc. VAT ) – 12 packs of 60 wipes (720 wipes in total or 5p per wipe)
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A gentle, sustainable cleansing option suitable for infant and baby care when wipes are clinically appropriate
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From Niche Healthcare
In most maternity and neonatal settings just cotton wool and water are used/recommended, for neonatal skin integrity less-is-more when it comes to skincare products. Where families choose to use wipes they typically bring their own. With older children (e.g. after introducing solids at 6 months) then most families have introduced their own choice of wipes and personally I don't know how often wipes are routinely provided in settings such as paediatric wards, as opposed to the dry cotton wipes (often used for providing personal care) with warm water and soap.
As for the sustainability credentials, the vast majority on the market are now free from plastic and although bamboo wipes are compostable, once used in clinical settings they go into hazardous waste with the nappy for incineration. Even when used for wiping hands/face, I don't know of any hospital that has a composting waste stream outside of catering so not always the eco-benefit it's made out to be. And while bamboo is an easy to source natural material with quick growth, it obliterates biodiversity so presents other planetary health complexities. Finally, cheeky-wipes is a commercial brand that's available via a lot of retailers, so requires caution as use in clinical settings can sometimes be perceived as brand endorsement, especially when it comes to baby products.
Bamboo wipes are often promoted as a more sustainable option because they are biodegradable, but in a clinical setting this benefit is largely lost.
In hospitals, used wipes are disposed of as clinical or infectious waste, usually via incineration.
In England, plastic-containing baby wipes are already being phased out, with a ban on their sale coming into force in May 2027, so alternatives will be required regardless.
It’s also worth noting that bamboo isn’t automatically a low‑impact material. Large‑scale bamboo production is often managed as monoculture plantations, which can reduce biodiversity by replacing more diverse ecosystems with single-species crops. In some cases, natural habitats are cleared to make way for bamboo farming, contributing to habitat loss and reduced ecosystem resilience.
So while bamboo wipes may have environmental advantages in some consumer contexts, those benefits don’t really translate into healthcare settings where strict waste management protocols apply. A more meaningful assessment would look at the full lifecycle and wider environmental impact, rather than biodegradability alone.
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