Turkish Cargo had achieved significant feat by carrying 335 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to 61 countries during the year 2021.
Ensuring the flow of international pharma supply chains while countries closed their doors to one another during the pandemic, Turkish Cargo continued to airlift pharmaceutical products including vaccines to around 132 countries across continents, all of them secured within their specific temperature requirements.
The carrier’s TK Pharma service helped maintain the desired levels of security and intactness, which in turn enabled Turkish Cargo to reach 8 per cent market share in medical products category in 2021.
On the vaccine transportation operations, Turkish Airlines Chairman of the Board and the Executive Committee, Prof Dr Ahmet Bolat stated, “If we are flying free once again and hug our loved ones without a worry, vaccines produced by heroic scientists and carriers who transported those vaccines to all corners of the world have a sizeable contribution in that outcome. By establishing a corridor between over 400 international destinations, we ensured that vaccines remained accessible for all. Especially considering the low number of carriers flying to Africa, Turkish Cargo had an important mission to make sure people of this continent could have access to vaccines. We carried our over 30 years of experience in carrying medical products to our SMARTIST center recently, one of the world’s most modern facilities. We are ready to shoulder even bigger responsibilities for our country and world in air cargo sector.”
Turkish Cargo carried the most number of vaccines to Turkey followed by Brazil with 100 million doses in 2021. Amongst nations with over 1 million doses delivered were African countries such as Mauritania, Madagascar, Rwanda and Congo.
As for the manufacturer of the vaccines, the most flown vaccine was Coronovac with 200 million doses, followed by Biontech with 120 million doses, Astra Zeneca with 12 million doses, and Moderna with 4 million doses.
As one of the most preferred air cargo brands when it comes to transporting medical products with its fast and secure service, Turkish Cargo flies important medical packages such as medicine, vaccines, biotechnological products, diagnosis samples, sensitive medical devices, organs and tissues that comes with delicate temperature and time constraints under stringent IATA-CEIV Pharma certified quality standards.
Globalisation and increased demand for pharmaceutical industry due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is also increasing the demand for air cargo logistics. Turkish Cargo’s new air cargo facility SMARTIST at Istanbul Airport is on its way to become a global center for medical product transportation. As one of the world’s foremost air cargo facilities that spans 340 thousand sq mt, it offers significant advantages for quickly and securely transporting medicine and medical products with its heat and temperature-controlled area of 9,000 sq mt. With parking areas for cargo freighters around the facility, it is expected that the successful carrier will increase its service quality and market share with SMARTIST facility.
