Emergency deployment readiness relies on fit-for-purpose warehousing management, a capability that is often under-resourced. Since 2017, WHO has collaborated with 13 Pacific Island Countries (PICs) to establish national Emergency Medical Teams (EMTs). Warehousing EMT supplies can be a challenge due to inadequate storage facilities leading to storing EMT cache in multiple locations, suboptimal tracking, and maintenance.

To describe an agile EMT warehousing strategy in the Pacific for rapid mobilization for health emergency response.

WHO has worked with colleagues in PICs on national EMT cache storage, tracking, and maintenance. The warehousing system needed to match available storage solutions in hot, humid climates. An inventory management system was designed for ease of use for national EMT logisticians with small support staff.

WHO logisticians created a two-fold solution for national EMT warehousing: an EMT-focused stock report system and a semi-mobile storage solution. The system automates stock tracking with regular warehousing features while also offering deployment history tracking with a three-color tier coding system of stock readiness for deployment. Complementing the stock tracking is a shipping container, refitted into a modular storage room, which provides a secure, relocatable solution.

Effective EMT warehousing is central to rapid and quality deployments. Continued work is necessary to improve EMT warehousing in PICs and explore its applicability to other low—and middle-income country EMTs. Solutions must be tailored to local contexts, and resources allocated to ensure efficiency and sustainability. The experience in the Pacific with innovative warehousing solutions can be adapted by other national EMTs in low-resource settings.