04 Feb 2016   

Cooling that saves lives

Sure Chill is a brand new kind of cooling technology with the power to save lives around the world. Today the technology is providing accurate cooling for vaccines in 38 countries. Helping to save lives and ensure vaccines are delivered to the patient in perfect condition.

The technology doesn’t need a constant power source and is therefore suited to the harshest of environments. With intermittent or erratic power, it works perfectly well. Without power, but teamed with solar, it also works perfectly.

The Benefits of Sure Chill technology:

• World Health Organization PQS approved.
• Accurate and reliable 4°C cooling.
• Sure Chill technology can run on as little as 2½ hours of power per day.
• Unrivalled holdover times mean that vaccines are kept perfectly safe for up to 14 days in the event of a power outage.
• Sure Chill technology offers Grade A freeze-free protection.
• Solar-powered options available for off-grid locations.

Trusted technology

Medicines and vaccines are only as good as the facilities that store them. In parts of the world where there is little or no power, clinics and hospitals struggle to treat people. Not because they don’t have access to treatments, but because there is no way to store the medicines safely. Because Sure Chill can run without power for days at a time, it has the potential to save countless lives in poor and rural communities. More than 38 countries worldwide are already using Sure Chill technology to support their immunisation programmes and safely store their vaccines.  UNICEF, Ministries of Health and other major NGOs trust Sure Chill technology to protect their vaccines.

Perfect 4°C

Because Sure Chill works in a completely different way from conventional medical refrigerators as it entirely avoids common problems such as stratification and freezing. The temperature within a Sure Chill refrigerator when stabilized can only ever be 4°C. There is no difference in temperature from one shelf to the next. Every product is perfectly cool. No freezing. No spoiling.

Sure Chill doesn't rely on mains electricity so loss or lack of power is simply not a problem. It goes on protecting vital medical supplies when other refrigerators would fail.

This lack of reliance on mains power has another significant benefit in the medical field. Storage of life-saving vaccinations and medical supplies in remote areas where power is unreliable or nonexistent is now possible. Communities that are hard to reach are no longer impossible to treat.

Saving Lives in Zambia

The Kayosha maternity clinic in Zambia is only 40km from the country's capital, Lusaka. But it could be in the middle of nowhere - the dirt roads make it difficult to reach the clinic, even by car. And the remote location makes power unreliable at best - they only have access to around eight hours of electricity on a good day. With temperatures up to 40°C, keeping vaccines safe and cool in a conventional medical refrigerator is impossible.

"We didn't dare open the refrigerator when the power was out"

The midwife at the clinic explained how the regular power outages weren't just inconvenient, but life threatening. If a child was in urgent need of a vaccine but the power was out, the staff had no choice but to wait. They couldn't risk opening the refrigerator and ruining their entire stock of vaccines by exposing them to the extreme heat.

Sure Chill keeps cool through any crisis

When a Sure Chill vaccine refrigerator arrived at the clinic, everything changed. For the first time, staff had a refrigerator they could rely on to stay cool through any eventuality. With only four hours of power per day, the Sure Chill refrigerator kept a safe and constant 2 - 8°C whatever the temperature outside. And crucially, however many times the refrigerator needed to be opened to access vaccines.

Vaccines are now safe and, for the first time, accessible 24/7 on the hottest days and during power outages.

Sure Chill stores extra energy for when it's needed

The remarkable Sure Chill technology also had another welcome benefit for the maternity clinic. If the refrigerator is powered for more than the required four hours a day, the internal thermal energy store saves that extra power for when it's needed. Once fully charged, the refrigerator can run for 10 days without power during external temperatures of up to 43ºC. For a clinic like Kayosha that couldn’t rely on regular power, being able to rely on Sure Chill was a life-saver in so many ways.

The last mile

The Sure Chill Company is committed to improving the vaccine cold chain and supporting efforts to eliminate preventable diseases worldwide. Recently, the company was awarded $1.5M by The Bill & Melinda Gates foundation to do just that. The funding has allowed the company to use its ground breaking cooling technology to develop a vaccine cooler which will operate for over 35 days without any power whatsoever.

A better future

Sure Chill is a cooling system that’s life-changing. And life-saving. Because the system is based on a law of nature, appliances using it are reliable and robust even in the harshest environments. From refrigerators that chill cans of cola in a hot Manhattan summer to those that store medicines and support blood banks in remote medical centres, refrigeration systems are essential to every part of people’s lives. With Sure Chill, there are no more barriers to reaching the people who need them most.