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Vaccine 'backpack' earns FPA's
Special Citation
The Flexible
Packaging Assn. (FPA) awarded its Special Citation
for Social Responsibility to the World Health Organization (WHO)-approved
Coldpack AntiFreeze Vaccine Backpack developed by Coldpack
System during the 2009 FPA Flexible Packaging Achievement
Awards competition.
By Jim Butschli, Editor
Coldpack refers to the backpack as the AirLiner, an inflatable,
insulating liner designed to convert a corrugated box into a cooler.
It ships and stores flat, taking up little space in a warehouse
or during transportation.
WHO field-tested the AirLiner containers in Sudan about three years
ago, says David McKinney, Coldpack System's COO. In a September
2007 test report, WHO noted that the Backpack met WHO/UNICEF Standard
E4/VC2. The report offered the following comments:
"Comes in flat packing, and must be assembled by the user
based on the pictorial guidelines provided. Inside surface of the
lid has a table and a thermometer for user to decide the number
of ice packs required based on the ambient temperature. Five ice
packs are required at 43ºC ambient to secure 35 hours of cold
life without openings. [Fewer] ice packs are required at lower temperatures.
Ice packs do not need to be conditioned; they must be loaded as
fully frozen in this carrier. The system is designed to prevent
freezing temperatures in the vaccine compartment. It is designed
with self-gripping strips to allow users to carry it as a backpack."
The supplier's Web site says the AirLiner's patented,
internal heat-barrier technology keeps product cold. The company
credits the Ernest O. Berkeley National Laboratory with developing
the gas-filled panels central to the AirLiner's design. "The
backpack is made with layers of reflective barrier film that are
heat-sealed into a proprietary geometry," the site explains.
"These unique aluminized, honeycomb baffles block heat transfer
to keep the heat out, so product stays cooler longer. You can even
choose to enhance AirLiner's performance by inflating it with
an inert gas." Instructions are provided on the company's
site.
AirLiner is available in various sizes, and in one to four-baffle
versions. A two-baffle version, for example, is recommended for
overnight shipments where controlling the temperature is "mildly
critical." A four-baffle version is designed for high dollar-value
shipments with a wide range of temperature needs in longer delivery
times.
What do pharmaceutical
buyers want in machines?
What should builders of packaging machinery keep an eye on when
it comes to supplying the pharmaceutical industry with new equipment?
That's the question asked recently at the end of a conversation
with an engineer at a large pharmaceutical company. Here were some
of his thoughts:
- Focus on efficiency. Speed is less critical. I can buy a machine
that will carton at 300/min, but if it's down much of the time,
it's not going to run at 300/min.
- A line only runs as efficiently as its least reliable machine.
So efficiencies on individual pieces of equipment need to be in
the 98% range if you want the overall line to run at around 70%
efficiency.
- Too often a machine builder won't run more than 10,000 pieces
through as a final test, whether it's cartons or vials or whatever.
We like to see 500,000 to a million components burn through the
equipment. Yes, it's expensive, especially if you're shipping
those packaging components to Europe. But it's more costly to
have a piece of equipment running unsuccessfully on our plant
floor because it wasn't tested correctly prior to shipment.
- Anti–counterfeiting initiatives have a big impact on today's
pharmaceutical packaging lines. The anti–counterfeit device itself,
whether covert or overt, has to be deployed, tested, and maintained
through the packaging process. This can require new pieces of
equipment, and again, when you add equipment to a packaging line,
do you have a negative impact on line efficiency?
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