Demand for ultra-cold storage freezers has spiked as governments and manufacturers prepare to ship Covid-19 vaccines around the world and along the so-called last mile to those most vulnerable to the disease.
Unique characteristics of the two leading Covid-19 vaccines mean they both have to be transported frozen. The shot developed by US biotech Moderna, currently under regulatory review in the US and the EU, can survive for six months at minus 20C, the temperature of a standard domestic freezer. The vaccine developed by Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech, approved for use in the UK this month, must, in contrast, be transported at minus 70C.
“A lot of governments even today are not prepared,” said Jesal Doshi, deputy chief executive at B Medical Solutions. The Luxembourg-based freezer producer has more than tripled its normal annual production of 500 to 1,000 units, recording massive demand for its 700L unit, used in laboratories and hospitals, which can store up to 280,000 vaccine doses.