Immunization Supply Chain (iSC) interventions: lessons and best practices for reaching under-served zero-dose communities

How Immunization Supply Chains (iSC) contribute to identifying, targeting, and reaching zero-dose communities - a webinar series in 3 parts

Immunization is among the most cost-effective public health and development interventions at hand. While significant gains in reaching more people with more vaccines have been made since the 1974 launch of the Extended Program on Immunization (EPI), improvements stagnated in the recent decade and backslid dramatically during the Covid-19 pandemic when global coverage dropped to 81% in 2021. The WHO and UNICEF estimates of immunization coverage (WUENIC) found that 25 million children were left either unvaccinated (zero-dose) or incompletely vaccinated in 2021, an increase of more than 5 million compared with 2019.

For immunization programs to recover from the pandemic and to accelerate progress towards the IA2030 goal of halving the number of zero-dose children by 2030 will requires scaling up of effective and innovative strategies, including efficacious immunization supply chains. Reliable, resilient, and equitably distributed supply chains form the foundation for immunization services that reach all communities and population groups within a country.

Immunization supply chains face multiple challenges in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), including last mile delivery, weak distribution systems and duplicative supply structures, limited commodities visibility, weak stock management performance, and inadequately equipped supply chain professionals.
Effective supply chains are critical for consistently reaching under-served and disadvantaged populations with vaccinations and primary health care (PHC) services, as this webinar series seeks to demonstrate. This series provides technical guidance and paired with practical examples of effective immunization supply chains (iSC) solutions from countries.