How Rescue Drones Will Save Kaduna’s Healthcare Sector

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Hundreds of health facilities in Ghana are receiving medical supplies, such as blood, medicine and vaccines within minutes, through the use of drone technology. These life-saving drones are heading to Nigeria, with Kaduna and Cross River states serving as the nation’s flagship to launch the use of drones for health services. At high speed and within minutes, drones will begin delivering medical supplies to hundreds of primary health care centers in hard-to-reach areas of Kaduna State in October.

In January 2020, Zainab Ahmed, a mother of one eight months pregnant, was bitten by a snake in her home in Kinkinau, Kaduna state. Two hours of frantic rush to various hospitals in the metropolis in search of anti-snake venom could not save his life and that of his unborn child. Two lives were ultimately cut short due to the unavailability of anti-snake venom and other logistical hurdles.

Pregnant women like Zainab and many Nigerians living in hard-to-reach communities have lost their lives due to similar challenges, in particular insecurity, poor accessibility of roads and poor human resources becoming more and more difficult. major obstacles to the health sector in Nigeria.

With drones, however, medical supplies, such as anti-snake venoms, vaccines, as well as blood and blood products, can be transported faster to more distant locations within minutes. It is on this technological innovation that Ghana, behind Rwanda in Africa, has capitalized and will soon arrive in Kaduna State in Nigeria.

To eliminate logistical challenges and improve the overall delivery time of medical supplies to health facilities in the hinterland, the Kaduna state government signed a memorandum of understanding with a US medical center in February. product delivery company, Zipline.

The drone components are housed in a warehouse in the flight operations section of each distribution center

Thanks to drone technology, medical supplies will reach the most remote communities in record time and lives like Zainab and her baby can be saved.

According to Kaduna State Commissioner for Health, Dr Amina Mohammed Baloni, it would also improve two of the five key health indicators defined by the World Health Organization (WHO).

“Access to maternal, child and child health and health services, which directly depend on the constant availability of health products at the point of service delivery, will be improved,” said Dr Baloni.

According to the WHO, the high number of maternal deaths in some parts of the world reflects unequal access to health services.

Nigeria already accounts for around 20 percent of global maternal mortality and is one of the countries with the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. In January 2021, Kaduna Maternal Accountability Mechanism Co-Chair Mustapha Jumare said Daily trust on Sunday Factors responsible for maternal mortality in Kaduna State ranged from poor human resources to unavailability of drugs for pregnant women and insecurity.

But Dr Baloni explained that as soon as the drone delivery service takes effect, residents of the insecurity and other challenges backcountry state will benefit immensely from product delivery. vital in an emergency. She said drugs for postpartum hemorrhage, such as misoprostol and magnesium sulfate, as well as other emergency drugs, such as snake venom, blood and blood products, would be easily accessible.

Indoor zipline in Omenako, Ghana

The Ghana health service is currently using drones for the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines with the aim of managing the pandemic and ensuring rapid and wide distribution in remote areas. As the second country in Africa to adopt drone technology for health services, Ghana currently has the largest medical drone supply facility in the world.

Zipline, a California medical delivery company that designs, manufactures and operates delivery drones, has established Ghana’s first facility in Omenako, over an hour’s drive from the country’s capital, Accra.

Although the former, the Omenako facility is also the smallest and currently serves the eastern and central regions of the country, distribution of medical supplies to around 600 health facilities. Ghana has four distribution centers, which serve more than 2,000 health facilities, each facility consisting of two separate but complementary centers. sections – Flight execution and operations.

Draped in protective blue foot covers, journalists from Kaduna State were guided on a tour of the facility. Fulfillment operations are where drugs are stored and orders from healthcare facilities are received, then packaged and delivered to airline operations for later delivery. Packaged with a variety of freezers, including ultra-cold freezers that process Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine, which is stored at 80 degrees Celsius negative, pharmacists, public health professionals seemed busy sorting, checking and pack medical supplies.

“Before serving a facility, you must complete training with us at Zipline Academy. So we go to that facility, take the contact details of where you want the product to be delivered, and train the various health workers there on how to use the service. For each establishment there are specified people who can order so that not just anyone can place orders. Orders mainly come from WhatsApp, call centers and SMS messages, ”said Nathaniel Nurtey, a Fulfillment operator.

Drones

Drones and other components are housed in the flight operations section of the facility. Using the magic wand, a phone with Zipline software, the Quick Response Code (QR) of a delivery package is scanned towards the drone, directing it to its point of delivery.

“It takes an hour for the package to be delivered to the most remote health center within an 80 km radius in Ghana. By road, it will take about three to four hours to deliver the same thing, ”Nurtey said.

Each medical package contains a maximum of 1.6 kg of medical supplies, which are bar-coded and contain the product name of the healthcare facility for which it is intended and the expiration date of the product. The flight operator places the red medical packaging box with a paper parachute strap into the payload, which is the drone compartment before performing the pre-flight checks. This is then transported by Zipline’s two-meter-long drones to designated coordinates.

Our correspondent observed that the drones were launched with an electric catapult powered by a super capacitor, as a result of which it flies to its destination in front of the flight operators, using an interface.

As soon as the drone takes off, the flight operators explain that the designated health establishment is notified. At five minutes from the drop-off time, the health establishment is again warned to wait for the package.

But unlike airplanes, drones don’t land, it descends to 20-35 meters before a motor activates the release mechanism latch and it opens. The package is then ejected under a paper parachute as the drone returns to the distribution center.

But as with any technology, zip line operators agree that unforeseen circumstances and technical faults can arise during transit. When this happens, the drone, which has a back-up battery and can fly on either of its two propellers, can descend using a parachute in the event of a major failure.

“When a storm or a strong wind causes it to deviate from its trajectory, the drone returns to its base. The user interface will be notified if the mission fails and the drone cannot deliver the package, ”the Zipline operator said.

How Zipline will work in Kaduna

When it takes off in Kaduna, three sites will come into effect to accommodate all health facilities within the state’s three senatorial districts. Already, all health facilities have been mapped by Zipline with the first distribution center to start up in Pambegua, in the Kubau local government area in the state.

Zipline’s head of execution operations in Ghana, Samuel Akuffo, said Kaduna’s first distribution center would launch in October and serve more than 200 health facilities. He said some of the main benefits Zipline hopes to bring to Kaduna included emergency just-in-time deliveries to the gates of healthcare facilities.

“For very critical life-saving drugs like anti-snake drugs, anti-rabies and other life-saving life-saving diseases like blood, we hope Zipline would be a key partner in using drones to deliver on time,” he said. Akuffo said. .

Already, the company has recruited natives of the state, who have been trained to work in the facilities. Kwasu Kanchok, who is one such person, will serve as the community leader for KD1 in Pambegua. He told our correspondent that he and many others received vigorous training at Zipline Academy on how to bring health care closer to the people.

Speaking on the deal, Kaduna State Commissioner for Health Dr Amina Mohammed-Baloni explained that the contract with Zipline was for four years, which would be renewable depending on the delivery of the contractual commitments of both parties and the will to continue with the service exclusively from the side of the state government.

Dr Balone said health products, including COVID-19 vaccines or routine immunization vaccines that require heat labile conditions for storage that are not available in a significant percentage of back-to-back health facilities -country, could be delivered within an hour of placing an order.

Speaking further, she said there would be a reduction in the average logistics cost over time and an improvement in the overall delivery time. She pointed out that difficult terrain by land logistics could be bypassed and deliveries made at night, which is not applicable with land logistics system.

“There will be just-in-time delivery of scarce products by centralizing inventory with Zipline, which allows for better inventory management and, by extension, better inventory visibility and reduced expiration losses. Only unit quantities of products would be delivered to health facilities per need, as opposed to larger quantities of stock, ”she said.

The commissioner further said it would reduce hoarding by larger healthcare facilities and at the same time reduce waste due to expiration and spoilage of products due to hoarding and inadequate storage capacity.

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