Second Deloitte white paper urges stakeholders to develop standards, processes and capabilities so that all citizens across the globe have access to lifesaving therapies.
A new Deloitte report calls for international healthcare organisations to promote global standards, such as the GS1 DataMatrix barcode to ensure citizens around the world have a speedy, equal, and secure access to Covid-19 vaccines.
“Now more than ever, leaders in the global health community must develop standards processes, and capabilities to ensure citizens across the globe have access to lifesaving therapies”, states the Deloitte study, Securing trust in the global supply chain of Covid-19 vaccines, moving from development success to vaccination.
Today, after more than two years living with the pandemic, there is no reliable, transparent way to verify where vaccines are in many countries, and whether supply is meeting demand. This not only affects confidence in the vaccine supply chain, but it can also exacerbate healthcare inequalities and compromise patient safety.
Adopting a harmonised global standard for identification and traceability would make a difference, explains the Deloitte report.
Requiring serialisation of vaccines would allow for more efficient and accurate traceability of vaccine administration and can help fight fake and counterfeit vaccines. In addition, serialisation would make it easier to calculate vaccination rates, identify bottlenecks and recognise where vaccines are being wasted, all issues affecting with particular emphasis the developing countries.
More than 75 countries are requiring or accepting the GS1 DataMatrix, a 2D barcode recommended by healthcare stakeholders that includes critical data such as expiration dates and lot numbers, helping reduce errors and enabling traceability of medical products. The GS1 DataMatrix can be leveraged for “identification and traceability of medical products such as Covid-19 vaccines”, states the Deloitte report.
The learnings throughout this pandemic can be crucial to better prepare the world for future health crises. “We can emerge stronger out of this pandemic if all healthcare stakeholders are committed to enhance collaboration and to transform in concrete solutions the insights gained over the last two years. GS1 stands ready to support these efforts”, said Ulrike Kreysa, Senior Vice-President Healthcare at GS1 Global Office.
Further information can be found on https://www.gs1.org/industries/healthcare/trust
The press release is available here and the Deloitte report can be download here.