Dry ice, containers and overworked doctors: the hurdles for Japan's vaccine roll-out

NIPPON EXPRESS HOLDINGS

27/01/2021 24:00

By Tim Kelly and Rocky Swift
    TOKYO, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Japan's vaccination roll-out faces
logistical hurdles that could further delay the slow-moving
campaign, experts and officials say, complicating plans to
deliver widescale coronavirus inoculations in time for the
Olympics.
    Already the last major industrial country to start mass
vaccinations, Japan is likely to be hampered on the ground by a
lack of containers and dry ice and difficulties in recruiting
medical staff, more than a dozen people involved in the
inoculation drive told Reuters.
    Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has said vaccines are critical
to holding a successful Olympics after last year's delay. The
first shots for medical workers are planned at the end of
February, leaving just 145 days until the start of the Games on
July 23. 
    Japan will need to deliver about 870,000 injections a day to
inoculate half its population by then, with each person needing
two shots of the vaccine.
    "The government's plan puts a big burden on the individual
municipalities in giving out the vaccines," said Koji Wada, an
adviser on the government's COVID-19 response. "The big
metropolitan areas like Tokyo may have the infrastructure to
roll out the vaccinations smoothly, but more rural areas...
could have more difficulty."
     Companies that specialise in moving medicines say there may
not be enough specialised containers to transport the Pfizer Inc
 PFE.N  vaccine, which has to be stored at minus 75 degrees
Celsius, much colder than standard freezers. 
    A government source told Reuters that officials did not
begin assessing whether there were enough containers or dry ice
to pack freezer boxes until late last year. 
    Japan's vaccination tsar, Taro Kono, outlined the scale of
the challenge last week. The coordination of medical workers,
transport, freezer production, needle disposal and dealing with
local governments are handled by different ministries, he said
on Twitter.
    Medical staff, already exhausted from caring for a third,
deadly wave of infections, will need to be mobilised to give out
shots. 
    The vaccine is still not approved, although that is widely
expected by the middle of next month. Ahead of that, the health
ministry on Wednesday carried out a mock inoculation exercise in
a college gym in Kawasaki, 17 miles (27 km) south of Tokyo.
    
    DRY ICE   
    Japan has purchased enough Pfizer vaccines to inoculate 72
million people, more than half its population. The government is
buying some 20,000 speciality coolers and sourcing massive
quantities of dry ice for its transportation.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2JW1PN
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2JI1L7
    Japan produces about 350,000 tonnes of dry ice per year, but
it's mostly for food preservation, according to an official with
one of the major makers. To transport the vaccine, the
government will need either a granular or powder type of ice,
which can keep temperatures colder than the standard dry-ice
blocks used for food.
    "It's not just a case of being able to switch a part on a
machine, the production method (for the ice) is different," said
the official, who asked not to be identified. "It would take
several months to retool."
    Transport company Nippon Express Co Ltd  9062.T  was
involved in discussions to distribute Pfizer's vaccine, but was
depending on the drugmaker to provide special containers, a
spokesman said. 
    The company is building four specialised warehouses across
Japan to store medical products, but those won't be ready until
February and aren't designed for the super cold needed for
Pfizer's vaccine, he said.    
    
    FREEZERS
    Nihon Freezer Co, which makes industrial refrigerators, is
making 2,300 coolers for the government, but without a formal
contract until the first vaccines are approved, a company
official said. 
    Those can be plugged in to any 100V outlet, the standard in
Japan, although temporary vaccination centres such as schools
may need rewiring. 
    "We have made about half of them and should have the
remainder finished by June," the official said about the
freezers, which are manufactured in Denmark. "Finding enough
components has been difficult because of the sudden increase in
production."
    Medical equipment maker PHC Corp, which has been tapped by
the government for ultra-low temperature freezers, said it is
operating its main plant round-the-clock.
    Once delivered, the vaccines must be administered by already
overstretched medical workers. A Kyodo News survey showed about
80% of prefectural governments were concerned about having
enough staff to give injections.
    Multiple front-line doctors have said they lack manpower to
deal with the crisis.
    Nurses from the Self-Defense Forces have already been
deployed to some pandemic-stricken cities, and could be called
on again, a defence official said. The SDF has about 2,000
doctors and nurses qualified to give injections, though all
can't be spared, he said.
    Japan has also contracted for hundreds of millions more
vaccine doses from multiple overseas makers, but those won't be
mobilised for months.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL1N2K00A0
    That could add to doubts about the Olympics, but hurrying
along the process would be worse, said Yoshihito Niki, an
infectious disease specialist at Showa University Hospital.
    "It's better to move more cautiously and carefully with
vaccinations than to make local municipalities rush forward with
preparations," he said.

 (Reporting by Tim Kelly and Rocky Swift; Additional reporting
by Kiyoshi Takenaka, Mari Saito, Ju-min Park, Kazuhiko Tamaki,
Nobuhiro Kubo; Editing by David Dolan and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
 ((rocky.swift@thomsonreuters.com;))