Jan 19, 2021When the U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted emergency-use authorization to the COVID-19 vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech on Dec. 11, U.S. government officials said they expected to vaccinate 20 million Americans by the end of the month. As of this writing, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that about 30 million doses have been delivered by Pfizer, but only 10.6 million people have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and only about 1.6 million people had been fully vaccinated. Other countries have also experienced problems delivering the vaccine.
Why? Well, it turns out logistics is hard. To those who run supply chains for a living, this is hardly news.
One issue with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is that it must be stored at -70 to -80 degrees Celsius (-94 to -112 degrees Fahrenheit). This alone doesn't explain the distribution issues, though, because Pfizer has developed a storage box, about the size of a suitcase, that can be packed with dry ice to keep up to 5,000 doses of the vaccine cold enough for 10 days (as long as it remains unopened). Other companies produce similar boxes.
One big issue has been the lack of visibility from the production facilities to the hospitals, clinics and senior facilities where the vaccines are being given. States do not know when they are receiving shipments from the federal government, and they do not know what capacity is available at facilities that can store the vaccines at sufficiently low temperatures.
Facilities also don't know when they are getting shipments from the states, so they can't always arrange to have staff members available to get vaccinated. As a result, some vaccines have spoiled before they could be injected (see Thousands of COVID-19 Vaccines Wind Up in the Garbage Because of Fed, State Guidelines). And in one case, more than 40 people in Boone County, W.Va., who were supposed to receive the coronavirus vaccine were mistakenly given an experimental monoclonal antibody treatment (see Here's Why Distribution of the Vaccine Is Taking Longer Than Expected).
Radio frequency identification and other Internet of Things technologies, combined with data analytics, could have greatly improved the rollout of the vaccine. If Pfizer were tagging shipments, it could have been providing real-time data to the governments regarding what shipments were being readied and when they left the factory. That would have allowed the governments to prepare for receiving the shipments and ensuring enough cold storage was available. Using RFID temperature sensors would have provided alerts about any shipments not kept at the proper temperature.
Once the goods were in hand, state governments would have been able to monitor both the arrival information and the estimated shipping times, along with the actual dates when their shipments were sent, allowing them to prepare to receive the goods and develop a plan for storing the vaccines and preparing shipments to facilities. This would have enabled the facilities to prepare to receive the vaccines and distribute them. Any delays would have been recorded automatically and all parties in the supply chain could have received alerts.
Data analytics would have enabled managers at the national level to view scheduled shipments, actual shipments and storage capacity, as well as quickly identify and address any potential bottlenecks or other issues that might have occurred. Obviously, it's too late to employ these technologies to address the rollout for the COVID-19 vaccine, but a national plan to use the technology for future, large-scale emergencies seems like a no-brainer.
Mark Roberti is the founder and editor of RFID Journal.
