Carbon Footprint Knowledge and Calculation among Nursing Students

Background: Nursing students as future health leaders to advocate for a greener planet, have a significant responsibility in mitigating climate change and reducing humanity’ carbon footprint (CF). While the CF per capita among nursing students is unknown, and whether they are well knowledgeable about effective measures for reducing CF. Aim: Assess carbon footprint knowledge and calculation among nursing students Methodology: A descriptive-analytic research design was applied for A stratified simple random sample to 279 nursing students from the faculty of nursing, at Modern University for technology and information. Two tools were used: (1) Nursing Faculty Students’ Structured Questionnaire which consisted of two sections to assess the demographic characteristics of the students and their families. Additionally assess students’ knowledge about CF. (2) Carbon Footprint Calculator. Results: 67.38% of students had a poor level of CF knowledge. The total mean CF of the nursing students was 5.874±0.182 mtCO2/year. Many demographic variables of the students and their families were associated statistically with the average students’ CF; gender, living alone, parents’ educational level, mother’s occupation, income, and place of residence. Statistically, significant inverse correlations were found between the students' CF knowledge with their average CF per capita. Conclusions: The majority of the nursing students had poor knowledge of CF, Additionally, the average CF per capita among nursing students was higher than the average CF worldwide and two-fold higher than Egypt's CO2 emission per capita. Recommendations: Updating the universities nursing curriculum with the environmental global issues, with a deeper focus on nurses' responsibility toward innovative strategies to lower CF.