COVID-19 vaccine delivery: an opportunity to set up systems for the future

Rebecca Weintraub; Stanley Plotkin; Margaret Liu; Jerome Kim; Natalie Garcon; David Bell; Dan Storisteanu; Toby Norman; Eliah Aronoff-Spencer

doi:10.12688/gatesopenres.13210.2

COVID-19 vaccine delivery: an opportunity to set up systems for the future

Gates Open Res. 2021 Apr 14:4:182. doi: 10.12688/gatesopenres.13210.2. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Rebecca Weintraub^{1

2}, Stanley Plotkin³, Margaret Liu⁴, Jerome Kim⁵, Natalie Garcon⁶, David Bell⁷, Dan Storisteanu^{8

9}, Toby Norman⁹, Eliah Aronoff-Spencer¹⁰

Affiliations

¹ Ariadne Labs, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Brigham and Women's Hospital Boston, Boston, MA, 02215, USA.
² Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA, USA.
³ University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
⁴ ProTherImmune, Lafayette, CA, USA.
⁵ International Vaccine Institute, Seoul, Seoul, South Korea.
⁶ Bioaster Technology Research Institute, Lyon, France.
⁷ Independent Researcher, Seattle, Washington, USA.
⁸ University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
⁹ Simprints, Cambridge, UK.
¹⁰ School of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases and Global Public Health, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, Ca, 92093, USA.

Abstract

The race to develop safe and effective SARS-COV-2 vaccines has moved with unprecedented speed. There are now multiple vaccines that have received emergency use authorization from the United States Food and Drug Administration and a host of candidates positioned for approval worldwide. Attention has now turned to allocation, distribution and verification of these vaccines, yet this focus exposes that the underlying infrastructure for global delivery and monitoring is threadbare and unevenly distributed. This presents both a barrier and an opportunity to deploy sustainable infrastructure. Major global stakeholders must convene quickly, collaborate, and collectively invest in global standards, legal models, common vocabularies and interoperable biometric-supported digital health technologies. As the COVID-19 vaccine effort scales, governments, private sector, and NGOs have the chance to place lasting resources needed for equitable and effective delivery that can pay dividends into the future.

Keywords: COVID-19; COVID-19 vaccine; SARS-COV-2; SARS-COV-2 vaccine; biometrics; health service deliver; health systems strengthening; identity; immunizations; vaccine deliver.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation [OPP1159073].