Near future
Contacts
  • Home
  • Tech
  • Health
  • Environment
  • Architecture
  • energia
  • Transportation
  • Spazio
  • AI
  • concepts
  • Gadgets
  • Italy Next
  • H+
May 22, 2022

Coronavirus / Russia-Ukraine

Near future

News to understand, anticipate, improve the future.

No Result
View All Result

News to understand, anticipate, improve the future.

Read in:  Chinese (Simplified)EnglishFrenchGermanItalianJapanesePortugueseRussianSpanish

Pfizer vaccine at Covid-19, the world does not seem ready to distribute it yet

We have a 90% effective vaccine, actually two. But how do you keep a cold chain on the planet to be able to move and distribute them? The current situation, with the differences between countries.

Gianluca Ricciodi Gianluca Riccio
in Medicine
Share24Pin5Tweet15SendShare4ShareShare3
pfizer covid-19 vaccine

A health care professional walks past an ambulance during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, US, November 13, 2020. REUTERS / Carlo Allegri

November 14, 2020
⚪ Reads in 4 minutes
A A

Apparently we have a Covid-19 vaccine that works (two, if we also give credit to the Russian Sputnik V vaccine). But can we keep it cool enough to get it to enough people?

Among the long list of risks and uncertainties for the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine (technical name is BNT162b2) that this week was reported to be 90% effective, is the challenge of its “ultra low temperature formulation”. How to keep it? How to distribute it along the way with the right "cold chain"?

Between production and doses administered to people, the vaccine should be kept frozen at approximately -70 ° C, approximately four times colder than a home freezer can handle.

The journey of the "Super cold" vaccine

Once the Pfizer vaccine has left the Pfizer manufacturing facilities in Kalamazoo, Michigan and Puurs, Belgium, it cannot be thawed and frozen more than four times in transit. according to UK health secretary Matt Hancock . This, if nothing else, adds a little "trick" to the complicated path.

Maybe you are also interested

Worldwide outbreak of acute childhood hepatitis: WHO investigates an Adenovirus

Almawave, wearable artificial intelligence that monitors COVID patients

Shanghai, now it's a nightmare: Omicron returns with interests (and a message)

Philippines from crisis to triumph: 500km of new cycle paths in less than a year

The vaccine, developed using a novel approach of using the coronavirus messenger RNA, is also unusual in its need for such low temperatures. 

Most vaccines are refrigerated at around 2-8 ° C, rather than frozen. Even frozen ones, such as the Varivax vaccine used against the chickenpox virus, are stored at much higher temperatures than Pfizer's.

Nilay Shah of Imperial College London says health systems have some experience handling cells and samples in temperatures around -70 ° C. However, that doesn't matter to the volumes expected with this vaccine.

The Pfizer vaccine and its "cold case"

Pfizer says it is confident it will be able to distribute the vaccine at such low temperatures. The vials of the vaccine will be placed in a specially constructed package the size of an aircraft carry-on, weighing approximately 32 kilograms. 

Inside, the dry ice will be able to maintain the temperature at -75 ° C, with a maximum temperature difference of 15 degrees, for a maximum of 10 days. Dry ice (solid carbon dioxide) would still be replenished during the journey. 

First question: do we have all this dry ice? In the USA and Canada yes (a commercial entity has already stated that there is enough capacity to provide that dry ice). And elsewhere?

Deliveries will be driven directly from Kalamazoo and Puurs and flown to the main hubs for subsequent distribution.

The easy part will be when the vaccine is on a truck, but it will become more difficult to keep the vaccine cold enough during transitions, such as when it is moved in or out of freezers at distribution centers. The capacity of ultra-low temperature freezers is already being expanded in transport and warehouse centers, but international distribution will be more complex.

The delicate nature of the vaccine means that everything must be ready at its "point of use", say a doctor's office. Once thawed and refrigerated at 2-8 ° C, Pfizer says the vaccine will be stable for five days, or no more than 2 hours at room temperature. 

Penny Ward of the London School of Pharmaceutical Medicine says careful planning is needed so that health care teams have patients "ready to go" at vaccination sites.

Ultimately, keeping the vaccine at the right temperature will be a big problem. But not insurmountable. Even if more equipment such as low-temperature freezers is needed along the supply chain, it will be possible. A gigantic infrastructural challenge.

And in warmer or poorer countries?

Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine

If in the more industrialized and "rich" countries the challenge appears enormous, but not impossible, the picture could be different in the warmer countries and in those without these infrastructures, or the resources to create them. 

Keeping vaccines at such low temperatures "is extremely difficult or even impossible" in low- and middle-income countries with hot, humid climates, according to a report released in October.

One way around this could be the process of removing the water from freeze drying, turning the vaccine into a powdered form. Pfizer says it is evaluating the approach, but it's a distant solution. 

Some countries may therefore put Pfizer vaccine aside, and opt for alternative vaccines that don't have to be kept so cold, should they become available. 

Even though Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccine appears to be 90% effective, we may see other countries choosing other vaccine candidates even if they are less effective, simply because the logistics will be much easier for them.

It is also possible that we will see one or more vaccination programs that involve moving to large vaccination sites (perhaps after checking, or quarantine).

The race towards the exit from this nightmare has just begun: today, however, we begin to understand that we have the legs to do it.

tags: CoronavirusCovid-19PfizerVaccine
Previous post

Here's how AI has already revolutionized the online gaming industry

Next Post

Oasys, a solar-powered oasis to cool off Abu Dhabi

COLLABORATE

To submit articles, disclose the results of a research or scientific discoveries write to the editorial staff
  • Domus trimaran

    Domus, crazy zero-emission trimaran

    12226 Shares
    Share 4888 Tweet 3055
  • Vaxinia, first patient receives oncolytic virus that kills cancer

    2031 Shares
    Share 812 Tweet 508
  • University of Maryland, new study: there would be a reality beyond this

    1998 Shares
    Share 799 Tweet 499
  • Hermeus tries it: hypersonic planes of 6000 kilometers per hour

    2789 Shares
    Share 1115 Tweet 697
  • Create 'renewable' or rather 'perpetual' bio photovoltaic cells

    8273 Shares
    Share 3308 Tweet 2068

archive

Have a look here:

Medicine

BrainQ, artificial brainwaves against stroke

The new BrainQ brain stimulation system based on machine learning accelerates and improves recovery from stroke.

Read More
working week

A four-day work week would reduce the environmental impact

brown and black metal tool

Bee venom kills breast cancer cells

Surgical robot treatments

STAR, autonomous surgical robot beats humans in difficult operation

Istanbul canal: Erdogan's dream, the nightmare of the city

Next Post

Oasys, a solar-powered oasis to cool off Abu Dhabi

The daily tomorrow

Futuroprossimo.it provides news on the future of technology, science and innovation: if there is something that is about to arrive, here it has already arrived. FuturoProssimo is part of the network ForwardTo, studies and skills for future scenarios.

Subscribe to our newsletter

Environment
Architecture
Artificial intelligence
Gadgets
concepts
Design

Staff
Archives
Advertising
Privacy Policy

Medicine
Spazio
Robotica
Work
Transportation
energia

To contact the FuturoProssimo editorial team, write to redazione@futuroprossimo.it

Chinese Version
Édition Française
Deutsche Ausgabe
Japanese version
English Edition
Edição Portuguesa
Русское издание
Spanish edition

The daily tomorrow

Futuroprossimo.it provides news on the future of technology, science and innovation: if there is something that is about to arrive, here it has already arrived. FuturoProssimo is part of the network ForwardTo, studies and skills for future scenarios.

Chinese Version
Édition Française
Deutsche Ausgabe
Japanese version
English Edition
Edição Portuguesa
Русское издание
Spanish edition

Staff
Archives
Advertising
Privacy Policy

Subscribe to our newsletter

To contact the FuturoProssimo editorial team, write to redazione@futuroprossimo.it

Categories

This work is distributed under license Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International.
© 2021 Futuroprossimo

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Tech
  • Health
  • Environment
  • Architecture
  • energia
  • Transportation
  • Spazio
  • AI
  • concepts
  • Gadgets
  • Italy Next
  • H+
This site uses cookies. By continuing to read it, you consent to their use.