{"id":5744,"date":"2018-12-22T11:46:19","date_gmt":"2018-12-22T11:46:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/vanuatu-uses-drones-to-deliver-vaccines-to-remote-island\/"},"modified":"2018-12-22T11:46:19","modified_gmt":"2018-12-22T11:46:19","slug":"vanuatu-uses-drones-to-deliver-vaccines-to-remote-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/vanuatu-uses-drones-to-deliver-vaccines-to-remote-island\/","title":{"rendered":"Vanuatu uses drones to deliver vaccines to remote island"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\"DroneImage copyright<\/span>
\n unicef<\/span><\/p>\n

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Image caption<\/span>
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\n The drone carried the medicine in a small styrofoam box
\n <\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A baby on a small Pacific island has become the first person given a vaccine delivered by a commercial drone.<\/p>\n

Unicef arranged for the drone to be flown some 40km (25 miles) across rugged mountains in Vanuatu that otherwise take hours to cross.<\/p>\n

About 20% of children in Vanuatu don’t receive important vaccinations because the supply is too difficult. <\/p>\n

The UN children’s organisation hopes that drone delivery will in future be of vital importance in remote areas. <\/p>\n

“Today’s small flight by drone is a big leap for global health,” Unicef executive director Henrietta Fore said. <\/p>\n

“With the world still struggling to immunize the hardest to reach children, drone technologies can be a game changer for bridging that last mile to reach every child.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Image copyright<\/span>
\n Unicef<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span>

Image caption<\/span>
\n
\n The first baby boy getting a vaccine delivered shot
\n <\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While drones have been used before to deliver medicine, Unicef says this was the first time globally that a country had contracted a commercial drone company to get vaccines to remote areas. <\/p>\n

Two companies competed for the project on Vanuatu, and it was Australia’s Swoop Aero that won the bid after successful trials earlier this month.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

Its drone carried the vaccines in a styrofoam box with ice packs and a temperature logger to a remote village on the island of Erromango, from Dillon’s Bay on the west of the island to Cook’s Bay on the east. <\/p>\n

The medicine was then used by local nurse Miriam Nampil to vaccinate 13 children and five pregnant women. <\/p>\n

Without the drone, Cook’s Bay is only accessible on foot or by boat – both those options take hours compared to the 25 minutes it took for the drone to reach the village.<\/p>\n

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<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

Medical supplies also have to be kept at a cold temperature. <\/p>\n

“It’s extremely hard to carry ice boxes to keep the vaccines cool while walking across rivers, mountains, through the rain, across rocky ledges,” Ms Nampil said. <\/p>\n

“As the journey is often long and difficult, I can only go there once a month to vaccinate children. But now, with these drones, we can hope to reach many more children in the remotest areas of the island.”<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n


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Source<\/a> by [author_name]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Image copyright unicef Image caption The drone carried the medicine in a small styrofoam box A baby on a small Pacific island has become the first person given a vaccine delivered by a commercial drone. Unicef arranged for the drone to be flown some 40km (25 miles) across rugged mountains in Vanuatu that otherwise take … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":5745,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5744\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}