Thailand develops robotic system to squeeze out more vaccine doses

On Aug 25, 2021

Thailand has developed a machine to draw out COVID-19 vaccine doses more efficiently and optimise lower-than-expected supplies, as the country struggles with its worst coronavirus outbreak.

According to researchers at Chulalongkorn University, who made the machine that has been used at the university’s vaccination centre, the AutoVacc system can draw 12 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine in four minutes from a vial. That is up 20 per cent from the standard 10 doses drawn manually.

The machine only works on AstraZeneca multi-dose vials currently and labels show each vial can provide 10 to 11 doses.

Juthamas Ratanavaraporn, the lead researcher of the team at the university’s Biomedical Engineering Research Centre said, “The machine guarantees with accuracy that we can gain an extra 20 per cent from each vaccine vial from 10 to 12 doses.

“The extra 20 per cent that we get means that if we have AstraZeneca for 1 million people, this machine can increase the number of doses to 1.2 million people.”

While some health workers using low dead space syringes (LDSS) that aim to reduce wastage can draw up to 12 doses per vial, it requires manpower and a high level of skill.

“This could drain a lot of the health workers’ energy. They would have to do this every day for many months,” Mr Juthamas said.

So far, around 9 per cent of Thailand’s population of more than 66 million have been fully vaccinated, with the rollout hindered by lower-than-anticipated vaccine supplies.

The research team say they should be able to produce 20 more AutoVacc units within three or four months, but that government funds and support would be needed to expand across the country.

Mr Juthamas said, the prototype machine costs 2.5 million baht (S$103,455), including other materials like syringes, adding that while they were open to export opportunities, that was something for the future.

They also plan to make similar machines to use with the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines.

“When the health workers are too tired, there are also chances of human error, so we should let the machines work on this,” he added.

Kamila/Reuters