Multimodal Vaccine Distribution Network Design with Drones

Shakiba Enayati · Haitao Li · James F. Campbell

37 citations0/0 files storedTransportation Science

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Facility Location and Emergency Management Supply Chain and Inventory Management Vehicle Routing Optimization Methods

Abstract

Childhood vaccines play a vital role in social welfare, but in hard-to-reach regions, poor transportation, and a weak cold chain limit vaccine availability. This opens the door for the use of vaccine delivery by drones (uncrewed aerial vehicles, or UAVs) with their fast transportation and reliance on little or no infrastructure. In this paper, we study the problem of strategic multimodal vaccine distribution, which simultaneously determines the locations of local distribution centers, drone bases, and drone relay stations, while obeying the cold chain time limit and drone range. Two mathematical optimization models with complementary strengths are developed. The first model considers the vaccine travel time at the aggregate level with a compact formulation, but it can be too conservative in meeting the cold chain time limit. The second model is based on the layered network framework to track the vaccine flow and travel time associated with each origin-destination (OD) pair. It allows the number of transshipments and the number of drone stops in a vaccine flow path to be limited, which reflects practical operations and can be computationally advantageous. Both models are applied for vaccine distribution network design with two types of drones in Vanuatu as a case study. Solutions with drones using our parameter settings are shown to generate large savings, with differentiated roles for large and small drones. To generalize the empirical findings and examine the performance of our models, we conduct comprehensive computational experiments to assess the sensitivity of optimal solutions and performance metrics to key problem parameters. History: This paper has been accepted for the Transportation Science Special Issue on Emerging Topics in Transportation Science and Logistics. Funding: This work was supported by the Association for Supply Chain Management (ASCM) and the University of Missouri Research Board (UMSL Award 0059109). Supplemental Material: The online supplement is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.2023.1205 .

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2000Use of location-allocation models in health service development planning in developing nations 2018A drone fleet model for last-mile distribution in disaster relief operations 2021Estimating the health impact of vaccination against ten pathogens in 98 low-income and middle-income countries from 2000 to 2030: a modelling study 2019Maximum coverage capacitated facility location problem with range constrained drones 2013The imperative for stronger vaccine supply and logistics systems 2016A review of integrated supply chain network design models: Key issues for vaccine supply chains 2020An inventory-location optimization model for equitable influenza vaccine distribution in developing countries during the COVID-19 pandemic 2011Vaccine Supply Chains Need To Be Better Funded And Strengthened, Or Lives Will Be At Risk

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