How do you monitor millions of doses of vaccines that are being rolled out across the world to ensure that they are in the required condition before being administered to patients in the battle against Covid-19?
Hanwell Solutions says its ShockWatch monitoring solutions are ideal for the storage temperature of Covid-19 vaccines, which must be maintained at the correct temperature during both transport and when they reach their destination.
Coronavirus jabs being produced by Oxford University/AstraZeneca, which requires temperature monitoring of between -2 to +8°C, Moderna and the Valneva candidate, which is undergoing clinical trials in Scotland, don’t require a super cold environment, but still need to be stored in medical freezers or fridges or else the vaccine is rendered ineffective.
Multi-award-winning Hanwell recommends the use of Shockwatch’s WarmMark monitoring system, a single-use, ascending time-temperature indicator which alerts users of exposure to unacceptable temperature conditions through a coloured window system on a single card tab. The UK’s leading manufacturer of wireless environmental monitoring equipment says WarmMark is a better option than data loggers because it’s a cost-effective solution that continues to look after vaccines over a sustained period of time, verifying at the point of use that temperatures have or haven’t been breached.
Data loggers have to be manually read or downloaded for analysis, but that is an after-the-fact discovery of temperature excursions. WarmMark allows quick and easy-to-view real-time monitoring and reporting of conditions gone astray, enabling quick response and correction – preventing loss of product and ultimately protecting patients from being administered a vaccine that has breached the integrity of the cold chain.
In addition to WarmMark, Hanwell also supplies its renowned IceSpy system for providing cost-effective solutions for wireless temperature monitoring within fridges and freezers, while its robust iSense product is an innovative self-contained unit enabling remote environmental monitoring of buildings, machinery, infrastructure or vehicles.
Derek Richardson, Hanwell’s International Sales Director, said the WarmMark solution is another safeguard for maintaining the effectiveness of vaccines during transport and when in cold storage facilities, needed during these critical times.
He explained: “Transport could be a weak link in terms of safety procedures due to inconsistent environmental conditions, but the WarmMark system will clearly show up red if vaccines – or indeed any other pharmaceutical products – have been compromised by a temperature breach. This could be a Godsend for the UK’s inoculation program which is likely to make use of completely new and untried non-medical facilities to store and administer the vaccines.
“Recent reports have shown that £5.8million worth of vaccines were wasted in 2019, mostly through breaching correct storage temperatures.* Having WarmMark monitoring in place should encourage all those who are responsible for the safety of these precious jabs to do their utmost to safeguard them under proper conditions.”
