Easton-Based Follett Partners With International Company to Produce Freezers for COVID-19 Vaccine
You can’t talk about vaccine distribution without refrigeration, which is good news for Easton-based Follett.
“We have been expanding our capability to support the rollout of the vaccine,” said Cindy Fitton, the Director of Health Care Marketing for the company.
They’re part of Operation Warp Speed, producing freezers for the Moderna and Johnson and Johnson vaccine that go to negative 30 degrees Celsius.
“We actually had orders for our 20 ft.³ upright freezers for vaccines in particular from a lot of the VA facilities,” Fitton said.
The company has produced hundreds of freezers for vaccinations, 120 for Warp Speed alone.
“We’ve been producing them for about seven years now, but the opportunity for usage has certainly expanded with these vaccines,” Fitton said.
A new partnership with Panasonic’s PHCNA, will produce freezers cold enough for the Pfizer vaccine – negative 80 degrees Celsius.
“It was a perfect marriage of the two. They don’t have the presence in the healthcare system that Follet does, we don’t have the ultra low cold temperature freezers,” Fitton said.
It’s one of the many local manufacturers contributing towards fighting the pandemic.
“I think people have come to realize during the pandemic how important it is to have a full supply chain on our own shores,” said Don Cunningham, the president and CEO of the Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation.
“We are, in the Lehigh Valley, a big part of the supply chain of the United States.”
Follett expects freezer demand to continue now that mRNA vaccines have been proven to work.
“We think there will be a lot of other vaccines and treatments moving forward with that new technology as a result of this vaccine,” Fitton said.
