Samsung Electronics was behind the K syringe to increase vaccination

When the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has allowed the number of people to be inoculated per bottle of the Corona 19 vaccine used in Korea to be increased by 1 to 2 people in the field when using the’minimum residual type syringe’, interest is drawing on the minimum residual type syringe.

LDS (Low Dead Space) is a special syringe made with little space between the piston and the needle in order to minimize discarded vaccines.

Domestic manufacturers Doowon Meditech and Shin-A Yanghaeng supplied them to the Korean Disease Administration, and Poonglim Pharmatech donated special syringes to the Korean government ahead of export to the US. Poonglim Pharmatech’s syringe is drawing the most attention. The special syringe made by Poonglim Pharmatech uses LDS technology to minimize the remaining amount from 70 to 80 µl to 4 µl, unlike general syringes, so that more than 6 injections are possible. Ordinary syringes can inject up to 5 doses with one bottle of vaccine. On the 17th, it was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

At the time the order was placed by the Korean government, the contract could not be concluded because the mass production system was not established, but the mass production system was quickly established.

President Moon Jae-in also visited the production plant of Poonglim Pharmatech in Gunsan, Jeollabuk-do on the 18th to check the production status.

At the time, President Moon pointed out that “Behind Poonglim Pharmatech’s innovation achievements, there was a win-win cooperation between large companies, SMEs, and the government.”

The large company President Moon said is Samsung Electronics. The success of Poonglim Pharmatech was supported by Samsung Electronics. Through the construction of a smart factory supported by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups and Samsung Electronics, the productivity of syringes could be greatly increased. At the time, Kim Jong-ho, head of the Smart Factory Support Center of Samsung Electronics explained, “We have set up a mass production system of 10 million units per month in one month by putting more than 30 experts from Samsung at the facility companies, mold companies, and Poonglim Pharmatech sites.” Initially, Poonglim Pharmatech expected to take about a year to build a mass production system.

Meanwhile, during his visit, President Moon mentioned that “Samsung Bioepis was very helpful in obtaining FDA certification.” In addition, it gained fame as it became known that the Japanese government was unable to obtain this syringe and had to discard 12 million out of 72 million Pfizer vaccines.

On the 27th, the COVID-19 vaccination and response team announced that when using a special’minimum residual syringe’ developed by domestic companies, the number of people vaccinated per bottle of Pfizer vaccine is 6 to 7, and the number of people vaccinated for AstraZeneca vaccine is 10 to 11. A guideline was delivered to the site that it would be okay to increase to 12 people.

[최현주 매경닷컴 기자 [email protected]]
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