WATERTOWN, Mass. — As manufacturers get closer to producing a COVID-19 vaccine, there is still a massive hurdle?
How do you ship hundreds of millions of doses that may have to be kept at arctic temperatures?
One of the companies leading the charge is led by a Massachusetts native.
FedEx may soon be shipping its most precious cargo ever, COVID-19 vaccines.
“We’re in 220 countries around the globe. We have 500-thousand employees around the globe that are ready for what will be our next Super Bowl,” said Watertown-native Don Colleran who is the President and CEO of FedEx Express.
He said early on in the pandemic FedEx shipped 1.7 billion masks around the world but transporting tiny glass vials of vaccines, once they are approved and ready, offers a whole new challenge.
They will likely have to be shipped in temperatures as cold as the South Pole and they may be manufactured in one part of the world and shipped to another all in a temperature-controlled environment.
“We’re ready, we’re preparing. We have global calls every single day that we do different scenarios and war game plans, if you will,” Colleran said.
In addition to its more than 700 planes, FedEx has refrigerated trucks and trailers with thermal blankets in temperature-controlled containers.
The company also has more than 90 cold storage facilities all around the globe to help safely move temperature-sensitive shipments.
“We want to get people back to work. We want some normalcy back and we think we play a critical role in bringing normalcy, not only in reduction of human suffering, but also in lesser extent, recovery of economies around the globe,” Colleran said.
FedEx transported swine flu vaccines back in 2009 and for more than a decade has shipped flu vaccines each season.
But Colleran said that nothing is more important for FedEx than shipping Covid-19 vaccines.
He said it will be their top priority even if it comes during the peak holiday season.
Cox Media Group
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