Study Reveals UK Hospital Menus Fall Short on Sustainable Food Options Despite Climate Goals
3rd February 2025. London, UK: A groundbreaking study examining NHS hospital menus has found that despite national recommendations to shift towards more sustainable, plant-forward diets, UK hospitals are showing limited progress in offering environmentally-friendly meal options.
The research, conducted by Plant-Based Health Professionals UK (PBHP UK), analysed hospital Green plans and inpatient menus from 36 NHS hospitals across the UK. Researchers assessed the commitment to sustainable catering by developing a novel scoring system to assess the availability of plant-based meals and of ruminant-meat based meals (such as beef and lamb), the latter of which are known to have a high environmental impact.
The analysis of hospital Green Plans showed minimal commitment to increasing plant-based options. The menus performed poorly, scoring an average of just 20 out of 100 points. This suggests hospitals have considerable work ahead to align their food services with climate goals.
Key findings include:
- Less than half of NHS Trusts included plans to increase plant-based options in their sustainability strategies
- All analysed hospital menus contained processed meat, despite its classification as a Group 1 carcinogen
- 42% and 50% offered no fully plant-based mains on their menus for dinner and lunch, respectively.
- Every hospital menu included ruminant meat (beef/lamb/goat) on their lunch menus
- Hospitals with outsourced catering scored higher on sustainability measures than those with in-house catering
- Most hospitals made limited use of techniques to encourage sustainable food choices
“Despite the NHS’s commitment to becoming a net-zero healthcare service by 2045, our analysis reveals that hospital menus currently show little alignment with sustainable practices,” says Isabelle Sadler, Lead Study Author. “With the NHS serving 140 million patient meals annually, there’s significant untapped potential to reduce environmental impact through menu changes.”
The study provides a practical framework for hospitals to monitor and improve their sustainable food offerings, offering specific recommendations including reducing ruminant meat options, incorporating more plant-based proteins, and removing processed meat from menus.
The survey also revealed an interesting paradox: while hospitals continue serving processed meats in the name of patient choice, the patients themselves say they would be open to removing these items from menus for health reasons. A large-scale consumer survey of 2000 UK citizens conducted by PBHP UK in 2024 showed that the public are keen to see healthier, sustainable hospital menus with over a third open to fully plant-based menus.
PBHP UK is now working to normalise and prioritise plant-based meals in healthcare settings through their national initiative Plants First Healthcare, which has been endorsed by 24 health and climate organisations.
Read the full study published in the Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics here. For more information, please contact:
Rohini Bajekal
Communications Lead, Plant-Based Health Professionals UK
rohini@pbhp.uk
About Plant-Based Health Professionals UK
Plant-Based Health Professionals UK (PBHP UK) advances health through whole food plant-based nutrition and lifestyle medicine, empowering healthcare professionals and communities to prevent, manage and treat chronic disease alongside promoting planetary health.