Optimal planning of the COVID-19 vaccine supply chain

This work presents a novel framework to simultaneously address the optimal planning of COVID-19 vac-cine supply chains and the optimal planning of daily vaccinations in the available vaccination centres. A new mixed integer linear programming (MILP) model is developed to generate optimal decisions regard-ing the transferred quantities between locations, the inventory profiles of central hubs and vaccination centres and the daily vaccination plans in the vaccination centres of the supply chain network. Specific COVID-19 characteristics, such as special cold storage technologies, limited shelf-life of mRNA vaccines in refrigerated conditions and demanding vaccination targets under extreme time pressure, are aptly modelled. The goal of the model is the minimization of total costs, including storage and transportation costs, costs related to fleet and staff requirements, as well as, indirect costs imposed by wasted doses. A two-step decomposition strategy based on a divide-and-conquer and an aggregation approach is pro-posed for the solution of large-scale problems. The applicability and efficiency of the proposed optimization-based framework is illustrated on a study case that simulates the Greek nationwide vacci-nation program. Finally, a rolling horizon technique is employed to reactively deal with possible distur-bances in the vaccination plans. The proposed mathematical framework facilitates the decision-making process in COVID-19 vaccine supply chains into minimizing the underlying costs and the number of doses lost. As a result, the efficiency of the distribution network is improved, thus assisting the mass vaccina-tion campaigns against COVID-19. (c) 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This work introduces a novel framework for optimizing COVID-19 vaccine supply chains and daily vaccination plans. A new mixed integer linear programming model is developed to minimize costs and dose wastage, with a two-step decomposition strategy and a rolling horizon technique for large-scale problems and disturbances in vaccination plans, respectively.