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Cold Chain Logistics: Poised for Growth with Lessons Learned from the Pandemic

As more complex, innovative specialty pharmaceutical products reach the market, including cell and gene therapies, there will be a growing demand for cold chain storage, transport, and distribution solutions.

'Now more than ever the need for collaboration and communication across stakeholders throughout the product journey is key.”
"Now more than ever the need for collaboration and communication across stakeholders throughout the product journey is key.”

By 2024 experts predict that five out of the top ten best-selling drugs will require refrigerated storage and handling. Between 2018 and 2024 there is a projected 50% growth in global biopharma sales for cold chain products, growing at approximately twice the rate of non-cold chain products.

At last week’s HDA Distribution Management Conference, Ann Pham, Director of Business Development at third party logistics provider ICS, discussed cold chain considerations from a 3PL’s point of view. She said that COVID-19 caused significant disruption to pharmaceutical supply channels, but the pandemic alerted the entire industry to become better prepared in the event of a future incident. “At the 3PL level refining and renewing previously developed supply chain, risk management, and business continuity planning strategies became a focus, as well as storing product across multiple locations to decrease the risk event,” said Pham.Hda Logo

As cold chain logistics increase in both importance and complexity, evaluating the supply chain or distribution strategy, analyzing solutions and associated costs, and identifying channel partners can seem daunting.  And according to the Institute for Human Data Science (IQVIA), the biopharma industry loses approximately $35 billion annually due to failures in temperature control logistics. “Temperature, excursions, or deviations from required storage and shipping conditions are a major concern for pharmaceutical manufacturers,” said Pham. “This was especially critical as we looked at the COVID-19 vaccine and associated therapy roll-outs because of the widespread concern that improper cold chain storage and handling would add to the pandemic crisis. But we saw tremendous collaboration amongst government agencies, manufacturers, 3PLs, and other supply chain partners, to build rigorous yet flexible logistic strategies that enable the safe and secure distribution of vaccines and therapies around the world. The strategy collaboration in conjunction with the significant investments 3PL's have made in recent years to build out their cold chain storage and distribution capabilities made the vaccine rollout successful.”

Pham added the collective experience and capabilities to support temperature sensitive products was in place, but alignment was needed on a plan to support rapid scale distribution with complex means. For example, if products with ultra-frozen requirements weren't distributed until after the vaccine doses thawed and the doses then needed refrigerated storage, it enabled supply chain partners to distribute vaccines at a more common temperature range, but it also required precise execution and coordination amongst all stakeholders to ensure that vaccines and therapies were delivered in a timely manner and administered within their short shelf life. She said, “We're taking the lessons learned from the COVID-19 vaccine and therapy roll out and applying them to our strategy as service providers. We understood the need to pivot quickly due to new demands on experience and capabilities, and to support these temperature sensitive products. Now more than ever the need for collaboration and communication across stakeholders throughout the product journey is key.”

Temperature Excursions

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