Drones Delivering Medical Supplies In Switzerland

Drones have made their way into numerous different industries and one of the more promising areas has been within the medical community.

Drones have been used to deliver medical supplies in numerous places around the world for some time now. Researchers from Sweden, Tanzania, the US, Rwanda, and other areas, have been experimenting with using drone technology to deliver life-saving medical supplies not only in rural areas but also in major metropolis settings as well.

In Switzerland,...

researchers there have been experimenting with their very own autonomous drone network that has been delivering packages, containing items like blood and medical supplies, to different testing facilities and hospitals.

Current options for delivery of those items are usually very costly third-party delivery services or in some cases they've even resorted to using a taxi to shuttle the necessary equipment. This drone network is a much more direct approach for getting the supplies where they need to be.

It's a different delivery system that has been envisioned to perform as a distributed, peer-to-peer network. The hospitals involved in the network will have established their own drone base, that could easily be located in their parking lot or on a rooftop, and they'll have had to hire technicians that will be able to work on-site in order to reload or recharge the drones if necessary.

The company behind the new drone network in Switzerland, is the California startup known as Matternet. Below is a video of the drone in action.

This project is only one of many that is seeking to introduce drone technology into the medical industry.

If drones can improve efficiency when it comes to delivering life-saving medical supplies and equipment, then it's no wonder that many hospitals might be interested in adopting this technology.

Those behind the new drone medical delivery network in Switzerland just received permission to start testing their network in populated urban areas early this year.

And this medical drone delivery network is said to be the first of its kind that is operating in a densely populated city area. They hope that their system will expand soon and eventually be introduced to Japan, along with Europe, and the US.