Healthcare and Urban Logistics

This chapter focuses on developments in the health sector with specific consideration of the challenges urban location presents to health logistics and proposes possible solutions. Sustainable transport as a concept is threaded across several sustainable development goals and targets, especially those related to food security, health, energy, economic growth, infrastructure, cities, and human settlements. Urban areas are often the site of significant concentrations of healthcare infrastructure with most large hospitals and specialist services being offered in cities, but they also often contain areas of considerable health deprivation. Digitalisation can have a disruptive influence on healthcare supply chains, whilst improving their operational efficiency and cost effectiveness through the timely reporting and sharing of information which improves product creation and distribution. Poor visibility of a product along a supply chain could result in over-ordering, waste, overconsumption, delay in receiving the product, and possible counterfeiting. Humanitarian logistics is a growing concern in urban logistics.