A system for supply chain management of covid-19 vaccines using blockchain and bluetooth beacons network based traceability and verification

School of Computer Engineering, KIIT Deemed to be University, Bhubaneswar - 751024, India

^* Corresponding author: junali.jenafcs@kiit.ac.in

Abstract

Ever since a novel Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) emerged in Wuhan(China), things have changed to a large extent. It has shattered the entire world in all the possible sectors by its continuous spread. Scientists all around the world have put in in-numerous amount of efforts as a result of which the world has finally witnessed its some of the first potential vaccines which have got approvals for emergency use in various countries. Now the next crucial step that comes in this process of fighting this virus is the supply of vaccines to all the different parts of the world. But there are certain challenges to this process as vaccines need to be constantly monitored all the time for their temperatures, humidity and other environmental factors which vary a lot depending on the geographical conditions. Also, maintaining drug safety is the most important challenge as counterfeiting of vaccines and drugs has always been a concern for the pharmaceutical industry. Manual traceability for all the ingredients used during manufacturing is a very difficult process and doesn’t even give a full guarantee for the same. This can lead to serious health issues in the consumers and can even result in death. The power of Blockchain and it’s principle of proof of concept can deal with this problem by maintaining a record for all the events taking place in this process right from manufacturing to vaccinations in hospitals. BLE Beacons can also come very handy here as they are small, inexpensive and easy to use devices that can provide real time updates by tracking various parameters of the vaccine. This paper aims at suggesting an entire system of supply chain of vaccines using Blockchain based record, QR(Quick Response) Codes for vaccine safety and BLE Beacons network for real time tracking and news updates of the vaccines.