The 6th Annual IQPC Cold Chain Distribution for Pharmaceuticals Conference was held

September 22-25, 2008, at the Philadelphia Convention Center, Philadelphia, PA. More than 300 delegates and 34 exhibitors participated.

Presentation topics were focused on logistics with an emphasis on international transport, clinical trials and the "last mile" of distribution. It was slightly more technical with less overt selling than in years past and there was no shortage of panel discussions and roundtables in addition to only a few case history presentations.  The event reflected the maturing of this segment of distribution as both presenters and audience were far more knowledgeable than in the past.  

The conference began with regulatory speakers from the UK and Canada providing updates to activities in their respective agencies. They concur that temperature monitoring will be viewed as a must-have, or a “critical component” to good distribution practices for time and temperature sensitive healthcare freight. Harold Rode of Health Canada was completely non-committal when pressed about when the agency is going to publish the revised edition of guide 0069 (currently under review).

Mary Foster of Catalent, and the person responsible for the re-write of USP General Chapter <1079> Good Storage and Shipping Practices, and stated that the new document draft ( 49 pages and more than 3X longer than the current edition) was submitted to the USP Expert Committee on Packaging. It came as a surprise to many in attendance that references to Mean Kinetic Temperature as it relates to transportation were removed by the USP 1079 revision committee and that they strongly recommended to the EC that it remain out of the document.

Other presentations of note: the new TSA 100% cargo screening regulations drew many questions for the presenter, Brad Elrod, Manager Global Logistics & Security, Pfizer, and  Jean-Pierre Emond from the University of Florida made a well documented presentation on testing he has done on the new generation of insulated sea containers and whetted the appetite of those considering the possibility of using them as an alternative to air freight. These containers are so well insulated that they hold only 40% of the payload of existing insulated reefers. He cited a reduction in freight costs by 40%. Their use is not without significant risk however, especially during loading and unloading at the port when there is no means to control the logistics or ability to provide AC power to run the refrigeration units. Emond objectively stated that the greatest drawback to this technology is that there are only 30 containers worldwide and the developer is not expected to play “build it and they will come.”

The “sponsors,” or service and supply partners to the industry appeared well organized. There were neary twice as many than at last year's conference (19). There is a definite shift in representation of those exhibiting, with 12 3PL and specialty logistics and transport providers, 10 data management companies and 12 packaging / platform providers.