Covid vaccine: Emerging tech to help manage cold chain

Never has any country needed cold chain tech as now. Never has any country planned to distribute a product to every single citizen within the shortest time possible.

The Covid-19 vaccine must be given to everyone within the shortest period possible. Emerging technology will play a critical role in enhancing the cold chain in India. Apart from logistical arrangements, the ability to store and deliver at the required temperature will be essential to the success of the effort.

Typically, the cold chain requirements are different for various categories of goods being transported. 

• (-28 degree Celsius to -30 degree Celsius) Deep freeze — seafood, meat exports
• (-16 degree Celsius to -20 degree Celsius) Frozen — meat, certain types of produce
• (2 degree Celsius to 4 degree Celsius) Chill — fruit & vegetables, fresh meat, certain dairy products
• (2 degree Celsius to 8 degree Celsius) Pharma — medicines, vaccines
• (12 degree Celsius to 14 degree Celsius) Cool-chain — fresh produce, processed food, over-the-counter drugs

Some vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna require very cold environments ranging from -70degree Celsius to -20 degree Celsius. But India is likely to go for the domestically produced version by AstraZeneca and Serum Institute requires just about 2-8 degree Celsius temperatures.

Even so, the cold chain will have to be enhanced and prepared for sustained, high volume delivery across every corner of the country.

Let us take a look at the various possibilities and technologies that can be at play. Monitoring the cold chain will be the most important priority of logistics companies. Here sensors and the connected system of IoT (Internet of things) will help logistics companies in monitoring and maintaining requisite temperatures.

Getting data in real-time at scale will be the greatest challenge for the logistics companies. Each of them will have to create dashboards, which don’t just monitor the supplies, but also have immediate resolution plans in place. For any breakdown in the refrigeration system, another set of remote management technologies will be required.

Augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR) will be deployed for remote maintenance of cold chain warehouses. Experts from one location can guide and help local teams with AR tools to immediately rectify a problem.  AR/VR will also be needed for rapid training of professionals who may not have the experience of managing vaccine delivery. Blockchain is already in play in the pharmaceutical industry to prevent fake medicines entering the supply chain. Expect the usage to increase in the next few months. Additive manufacturing and 3D printing will be required to rapidly scale the production of packaging materials.

The global cold chain market size is estimated to be valued at $233.8 billion in 2020 and projected to reach $340.3 billion by 2025, recording a CAGR of 7.8 per cent, according to a Markets & Markets report. While vaccine will play an important role in the next few months, the impact on the cold chain market will be longer. “Covid-19 impacted the supply chain of every industry due to restricted trade during the pandemic, resulting in food manufactures to emphasise not only on the food products but also on their storage to increase their shelf-life, which is expected to propel the market for the cold chain,” says the report.

In India, the Universal Immunisation Programme targets about 30 million pregnant women and 26 million newborns every year. An existing system of vaccine delivery exists, but will require a layer of new technology and process. The number of warehouses with cold storage will have to increase multifold to meet the needs of over a billion people.

India’s effort and its use of technology in the delivery would create a benchmark for the world.