Having successfully completed the initial pilot medical supplies delivery in London, healthcare logistics provider Apian, its partners Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation and drone maker Wing, have announced an extension to the tests, which will now continue until October this year.
The partners are transporting urgent blood samples, supporting tests for patients with conditions like bleeding control disorders or transplant patients, among others.
“After positive progress over the first six months, we are now exploring flying a broader range of pathology items, medicines and supplies,” Apian said in a statement.
“The trial began in October 2024 for an initial six-month period until 7 April 2025. The Civil Aviation Authority has approved a six-month extension to the airspace approval until 7 October 2025.”
Over the first six months since last October, the medical drone deliveries – from Monday to Friday between nine and four in the afternoon – have demonstrated the capability to make faster, more reliable and more sustainable deliveries than traditional land-based modes of transport, the company added.
Apian and its partners have tried to ally some public concerns over safety and privacy by pointing out that these deliveries are exclusively for medical products between hospitals, with no deliveries to individual homes.
This follows some recent media reports in England, which have claimed that some members of the public were alarmed at the prospect of drones flying in large numbers over their homes.
The updated plans would see drones flying between Charing Cross Hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital, University College Hospital and the Royal Free Hospital, if approved.
This means they would fly over popular spots like Oxford Circus, Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens.
In east London, drones would fly between King George Hospital, Queen’s Hospital and Barking Hospital.
One of the concerned locals Fereshteh Guillon, who lives near Holland Park, told the MailOnline; “Already, when I’m sitting in my conservatory, it’s really noisy – with planes flying over every few minutes. Now I’m going to have to deal with drones as well?
“I don’t mind if it’s going to help the hospitals – but they should have soundproof drones. Surely that’s possible. It also depends on the time of day. If it’s at night that will be very disruptive.
“Why were there no consultations for this? They didn’t ask any of us in the neighbourhood. I didn’t receive any letters. They should inform people of these plans before they go ahead with them.”
To be fair, we think he would be right to ask about awareness campaigns, if these were not done. And it would be unlike Wing to do that too; the drone company and its partners went on massive public awareness campaigns where they were introducing drone deliveries in Texas in 2020 and 2021.
Natasha McCluney, 59, works as a courier in Kensington was also sceptical.
“I really can’t see that working. It all feels a bit too sci-fi to me,” she said.
“It doesn’t feel like that’s been trialled enough – and I can just imagine the drones crashing. I can’t imagine the people living here would love things flying over their heads all day either. If it helps with the speed of those tests I’m all for progress – but blood samples feel like a really important thing to be transporting. So it makes me a bit nervous.”
The partners are doing their best to assure the public though, with Apian explaining that the drone that will be making the deliveries is actually made of foam, weighs around 5kg, carries packages of around 1kg, and will cruise at about 100 km/h.
“The drone has been flown on three continents with over 400,000 commercial deliveries and thousands more test and simulation flights,” Apian said.
Currently, the drones fly between Guy’s Hospital and St Thomas’ Hospital in London, and do not always follow the same route on each flight, but will only fly within the airspace corridor approved by the Civil Aviation Authority between the two hospitals.
“Wing’s delivery drones are among the safest ways to transport goods; they are safer for the community than having goods delivered by truck or car. There are multiple levels of redundancy built into the drones’ operations, including real-time systems that conduct health and safety checks on our drones and qualified pilots who oversee operations.
“The safety of Wing’s aircraft, personnel and operations are rigorously reviewed and all operations can only be undertaken with the approval of the regulators in each country Wing operates. In the UK, Wing works closely with the Civil Aviation Authority.”
On privacy concerns, Apian explained that the drones are built with the goal of delivering packages – not taking photographs. “They’re equipped with low-resolution, black-and-white camera sensors used primarily to assist with navigation and to help ensure the safety and reliability of our operations. There is no live feed of images available to anyone — including the pilots overseeing flights.
“From our experience over the first six months, most people do not notice the drones flying overhead. The drones fly higher than 70 metres above ground level and can pass extremely quickly at a speed of over 100km/h. While flying, the drone average noise level is lower than city sounds from ground-level and significantly quieter than a car driving by.”