Door-to-door prescriptions delivered by drone could start soon in the UK

Manna Aero that has already started trials to deliver medication by drone is in talks to bring door-to-door prescriptions delivered by drone to the UK soon.

The drone company, Manna Aero, initially aimed to deliver fast food by drone in Ireland, but has since the outbreak of the Coronavirus, it has abandoned those plans. Instead, the company is now working with Ireland's Health Service Executive to prescribe and deliver medication to people in the small rural town of Moneygall.

“We're not going to be selling hamburgers,” Manna Aero chief executive Bobby Healy said. “We're going to be selling what the elderly people really need to have – so basic necessities.”

The drone startup has been in talks with the UK Civil Aviation Authority to bring door-to-door prescriptions delivered by drone to the UK in the next few weeks. In England, tests have already been announced to bring supplies by drone to the sle of Wight during the pandemic.

Healey aims to bring the drone delivery trials to the UK in the next few weeks to “show people what we can do – perhaps work with the NHS”.

“We are actually looking to do that in the next few weeks – on the assumption that lockdown is going to continue,” he said, according to the BBC.

The Manna Aero drones can carry up to 9lb in its cargo space. And even though they are “not particularly beautiful,” or “particularly fast,” Healy said drones are “incredibly safe.”

Manna Aero can handle up to 100 deliveries by drone per day. The unmanned aircraft can manage moderate gales, although the company understandably prefer to fly in ideal weather conditions. About the drone delivery trials, Healy says:

“It's about proving that if there's a world in future where you need to do a lockdown, at scale, that drones can be a massive solution.”