Vaccines

The elimination of the cold chain for vaccines, with reduced costs and improved efficacy for vaccination, is an important objective for public health on a global scale. This has been explicitly identified by GAVI (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization) and other major public health organisations such as the WHO.

Summary: The Cold Chain

• Almost all vaccines demand continuous storage and transport in a cold chain in order to maintain activty. This requirement is costly, not always logistically feasible (e.g. in developing regions) and prone to inevitable breaks in the cold chain
• Detected cold chain breaks (from both heating and freezing) result in considerable wastage of vaccine
• Undetected cold chain failures give rise to an unknown level of reduction in efficacy of vaccines and result in disease and death from vaccine-preventable diseases