Global Supply Chain Optimization for COVID-19 Vaccine under COVAX initiative

After the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, World Health Organization (WHO) launched COVAX in April 2020 to bring together countries and vaccine manufacturers and provide innovative and equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines. We developed a global supply chain model to optimize the production of the vaccines and allocation to different countries worldwide. The global COVID-19 vaccine supply chain of COVAX should be resilient to various disruptions and risks. In this work, we develop an optimization model with risk mitigation strategies to determine the procurement of vaccines from production centers and distribution to different countries when the supply chain is subjected to various disruptions. Our case study demonstrates how different risk mitigation strategies would enable COVAX to meet the demand amid multiple disruptions. It indicates that it is feasible to meet the vaccine demand and help participating countries overcome the global pandemic.