(546g) Environmental Impact Minimization of Vaccine Supply Chain for Developing World

People in low and middle income countries are most vulnerable to environmental, climate change and human health impacts. Vaccines offer enormous public health benefits (avoid disease and reduce treatment costs) while emissions from vaccine supply system result in environmental/health impacts (Green house gases and criteria pollutants) in particular, immunization supply systems of low and middle-income countries are not optimized to reduce environmental impacts. Current immunization supply systems are optimized to minimize direct costs. Such an approach usually results in higher levels of pollutants leading to lower public health outcomes which in terms results in higher treatment costs to the society. This nexus is not fully understood or recognized by public health programs. A truly optimized immunization supply system will not only consider direct costs but also indirect treatment costs averted by minimizing public health burdens to the society.We will present an approach that utilizes LCA methodologies to optimize the life cycle of vaccines that include production, packaging, transport, cold storage, use and disposal in the context of developing world.