Study on the optimization of urban emergency supplies distribution paths for epidemic outbreaks

The humanitarian logistics vehicle routing problem (VRP) of urban emergency supplies in response to epidemic outbreaks is studied in this work to address the adverse effects of epidemic outbreaks on human society. Under the premise that the greater the urgency of the demand for various emergency supplies by the hospitals in the city's jurisdiction, the higher the priority of distribution, the fitness function of the highest vehicle utilization rate and the lowest transportation cost is established. The aim of the research is to construct a multi-objective mathematical model of emergency supplies distribution for large cities in case of an epidemic outbreak. Based on the multi-verse optimization algorithm and the differential evolution algorithm, a hybrid multi-verse optimizer algorithm based on differential evolution (DE-IMOV) is proposed. A simulation experiment is then carried out to verify the model. The calculation results show that the developed algorithm can effectively reduce the distribution cost and improve the full load rate of vehicles on the basis of considering the urgency of emergency supplies demand, which provides a solution for the optimization of heterogeneous vehicle distribution paths for urban emergency supplies in response to epidemic outbreaks.