Future healthcare logistics: a survey of the public opinion on drones in Denmark

Abstract

Drones are expected to become widespread in society, making public readiness an important prerequisite for successfully unleashing them. This article investigates Danish citizens’ opinions on drones across varying fields of application and, specifically, six potential cases of healthcare logistics. Survey data representative of age, gender, and geography were collected and included information about respondents’ background, knowledge level of drones, and opinions on different drone use cases. Data were analysed with frequency tables and bivariate cross-tabulation. A thousand and four Danish adults completed the survey. Although other fields of application received higher levels of support, a majority of the respondents were positive towards using drones for healthcare logistics. Transportation of medicine and blood samples between hospitals were the most accepted healthcare use cases. Support varies across age with the highest support found in the eldest age group. Also, the more citizens report to know about drones, the more they tend to support using them. The results suggest that policymakers and firms must be attentive towards the public opinion on drones and seek insights into what citizens regard as noble purposes of using drones. Moreover, citizens must become more acquainted with drones, as this will likely boost public support.

Keywords

• drones
• unmanned aerial vehicles
• surveys and questionnaires
• public opinion
• health policy
• delivery of healthcare