What 2023 numbers can tell reps about the category.
By Paul Girouard
If you have a Spotify account, December was the month to receive “Your 2023 Wrapped” list. They ask and answer a lot of great questions that cover your music interests throughout the year. There are questions like, how many genres did you listen to, what area of the world has similar musical tastes, how many songs did you play, who was the top song and artist, and how long did you listen? If you are a data geek like me, you probably found the metrics very interesting.
So, if we took Spotify’s concept and wrapped up the infection prevention category from 2023, what would it look like?
According to the CDC, 81.4% of the U.S. population has received at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, 69.5% has completed the primary series of the vaccine, and 11.0% have received the updated vaccine for the ’23-24 season. The percentage of nursing home residents that are up to date with Covid-19 vaccinations is 27%
Vaccine manufacturers estimate that they will supply the U.S. with as many as 170 million doses
of influenza vaccines for the 2023-2024 season. This is tracking to be a very busy season, so get vaccinated if you haven’t already.
Although demand spiked and has come down significantly from the pandemic, hand sanitizer usage remains up 2 to 3 times pre-pandemic, and hand soap is at 1.5 times pre-pandemic levels. Although the pandemic was painful, the silver lining is that it promoted better hand hygiene and that behavior has held steady.
Sales of surface disinfectant wipes have grown 10% overall, and 12.5% in acute care. Liquid disinfectants that were predominant during the pandemic have declined 6.5% overall. Surface wipes with hydrogen peroxide formulations were launched and are growing quickly.
Sterilants used in instrument disinfection/sterilization have declined 11.1% overall. It should be noted that a significant part of this decline is due to a market leading brand/supplier changing their distribution strategy and no longer going through the healthcare distribution channel.
It’s estimated that there were 48 billion gloves sold into the healthcare market in 2023. The glove product category is a meaningful piece of infection prevention and overall distribution business. It’s ranked the fourth largest category in the physician market segment, and second in the long-term care segment. There has been an excess of exam glove inventory in the market. Due to this, average selling prices for exam gloves are at pre-pandemic levels. On the positive side, there is an opportunity with surgical gloves due to increased patient volume and procedures in the ASC market segment.
Take a moment to review how you performed with your infection prevention business in 2023. Who were the top suppliers to help you grow? What were the top items that contributed to success? Where did you underperform compared to the market? What are the new products that will help you hit your goals this year? If you set up metrics like Spotify did, it will help you drive and improve performance for the category in 2024. Get busy.
Wash your hands!