Only when outside of combat, obviously. But frequently I'll want to take something from one soldier and give it to another one. Right now, because I can't click the left / right page-change buttons while the cursor is holding an item, I have to place the item in the ship inventory, switch pages, then pick it up - which is particularly annoying with large, cluttered inventories, because there may not be space for it on the first screen, making me flip through to an empty one, put the item there, change pages, etc.
Outside of combat, being able to just grab an item and flip to the soldier I want to give it to would be much more useful.