Learnings from COVID-19 for managing humanitarian supply chains: systematic literature review and future research directions

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has been experienced as the most significant global disaster after the Spanish flue in 1918. Millions of people lost their life due to a lack of preparedness and ineffective strategies for managing humanitarian supply chains (HSC). Based on the learnings from this pandemic outbreak, different strategies for managing the effective HSC have been explored in the present context of pandemics through a systematic literature review. The findings highlight some of the major challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, such as lack of planning and preparedness, extended shortages of essential lifesaving items, inadequate lab capacity, lack of transparency and visibility, inefficient distribution network, high response time, dependencies on single sourcing for the medical equipment and medicines, lack of the right information on time, and lack of awareness about the protocol for the treatment of the viral disease. Some of the significant learnings observed from this analysis are the use of multiple sourcing of essential items, joint procurement, improving collaboration among all stakeholders, applications of IoT and blockchain technologies for improving tracking and traceability of essential commodities, application of data analytics tools for accurate prediction of next possible COVID wave/disruptions and optimization of distribution network. Limited studies are focused on finding solutions to these problems in managing HSC. Therefore, as a future scope, researchers could find solutions to optimizing the distribution network in context to pandemics, improving tracing and tracking of items during sudden demand, improving trust and collaborations among different agencies involved in HSC.

The role of cryptocurrencies in predicting oil prices pre and during COVID-19 pandemic using machine learning

“…First, we use machine learning (Karim et al, 2021;Kazancoglu et al, 2022;Khalilpourazari & Hashemi Doulabi, 2022) to understand the predictability power of cryptocurrencies, the US dollar, and the COVID-19 on oil prices. Other studies used conventional models to investigate this relationship (e.g., Albulescu & Ajmi, 2021;Bénassy-Quéré et al, 2007;Charfeddine et al, 2020;Jareño et al, 2021;Mensi et al, 2020;Okorie & Lin, 2020;Kumar et al, 2022aKumar et al, , 2022bKumar et al, 2022aKumar et al, , 2022bNyawa et al, 2022;Queiroz et al, 2020;Queiroz & Fosso Wamba, 2021;Wen et al, 2018;Zhang et al, 2008). Second, we cover a longer period during COVID-19.…”

Blockchain technology in supply chain management: an organizational theoretic overview and research agenda

“…Min ( 2019 ) proposed supply chain resilience (SCRES) as a potential application area According to the study, BT has the potential to alleviate risks and uncertainty and enhance SCRES with the help of its features of immutability, traceability, risk management and smart contracts. Wang et al ( 2019a ) argued that future research on BT application in SC would focus on extending the provision of automated visibility/transparency, traceability (track and trace) (Kumar et al, 2022b ) to all the relevant stakeholders in SC to build trust by removing any disintermediation especially in SC’s related to crucial artifacts such as vaccine, diamonds, luxury items, etc. This is because as the implementation scale increases so does the need to be transparent and traceable.…”

COVID-19 in patients with total laryngectomy

“…Coronavirus disease 2019, which is the first pandemic after the Spanish f lu epidemic between 1918 and 1920, affected all of humanity. [16] Patients with chronic diseases are at the forefront of those who are affected by this acute condition. In this study, we examined the frequency and severity of the clinical state of COVID-19 in total laryngectomy patients, one of the patient groups frequently followed up in otorhinolaryngology.…”