The new coronavirus has transformed the way we live and challenged areas of activity and the market; the logistics chain was one of them.
Vaccination in Brazil and around the world
In January 2021, almost a year after the start of the pandemic in Brazil, a nurse went to first person vaccinated in the country. Two immunizers were approved for emergency use by Anvisa: CoronaVac, from the Chinese laboratory Sinovac in collaboration with the Butantan Institute, and that from Astrazeneca/University of Oxford, developed together with the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation.
Starting immunization not only on Brazilian soil, but in other countries, brought to the fore the responsibility of distributing the vaccine economically, quickly and, of course, safely. According to Pfizer's vice president of supply chain, Tanya Alcorn, The Wall Street Journal , “this is the biggest vaccination campaign of all time”.
The immunization scenario for logistics
In logistics, the transport operation that can be considered the most critical and necessary in the last 100 years is completed by multiple modes, and its key component is the air loading of cargo.
Having aircraft driving as the solid basis of an operation demands increased attention to a possible part of the process: the AOG (Aircraft on ground), a term borrowed from aviation to indicate maximum priority in air shipments, in this case, applied to the Pharma & Healthcare segment.
An aircraft has the autonomy to make complete deliveries (door-to-door), perform initial stretches (first mile) or endings (last mile) of a given route. When an airplane is unable to perform any of these sections, we say it is on the “ground” or “grounded”, this in reference to the AOG term.
Therefore, it is important that every air operator has an efficient logistics and maintenance system to prevent AOG situations, or else, act quickly to recover an aircraft's airworthiness condition. Thus, new flights can be launched, and of course, with due security reestablished.
But after all, how important is the AOG for the current pandemic scenario?
According to global data released by Johns Hopkins University, there are currently more than 150.000.000 million cases of infection with the new coronavirus and around 3.168.601 million deaths. In other words, transporting the vaccine and immunizing the entire world's population is almost a “race against time”, which means that every second that an aircraft remains stopped reduces the chance of rapid and mass vaccination.
The role of the logistics operator
From this perspective, it is up to each company in the logistics sector to strictly comply with the Nfo – Next Flight Out, and we are included in this! At Dux Logistics, working through the agency company, Dux Forwarding, we board cargo on the next available flight, following D+0.
Good news for the current pandemic scenario
Finally, the good news is that, according to an article published by Sheet, the world surpassed the mark of one billion vaccines administered against Covid-19 on April 24, approximately 128 doses for every 1.000 inhabitants of the world population. Our team continues to hope that this period ends as quickly as possible and that we can return to living our “normal”. Now that you know the importance of AOG for the times we are living in, click here to read other content on our Blog.