When the coronavirus hit the U.S., countless Americans were left unprotected amid a shortage of masks and medical equipment. There still isn’t enough. JulietLinderman and MendozaMartha report, along with frontlinepbs & GlobalRepCentre
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Now, with more than 210,000 Americans dead and the president himself infected with the virus, the U.S. grieves the consequences. And nurses are still being told to reuse masks designed to be thrown away after each patient. Meanwhile, studies in nursing homes -- in China, Washington state and across the U.S. -- found that COVID-19 cases were significantly higher in places with shortages of personal protective equipment, or PPE. Harvard Medical School professor Dr. Andrew T. Chan and colleagues found health care workers who didn’t have adequate PPE had a 30% greater chance of infection than colleagues with enough supplies. Black, Hispanic and Asian staffers had the highest risk of catching COVID-19, they found.
“This is a case where no individual health care organization is large enough to move the market and induce suppliers to invest in those types of supply chains,” said Dow. “So the government needs to be able to go in and guarantee a certain amount of purchases so that it will be in the self-interest of each one of these manufacturers to be willing to put in the investments into that supply chain.
In meetings, panels, even commencement addresses, Leavitt advised public officials to come up with back up plans. But they didn’t. Among his 26 specific findings: The U.S. government needed to buy and stock protective equipment during an emergency, in the event that traditional supply chains failed. Their key takeaways foreshadowed exactly what would happen less than a year later: In a pandemic, the U.S. would not have enough “on-hand stock of antiviral medications, needles, syringes, N95 respirators, ventilators, and other ancillary medical supplies.” Countries that make those supplies were going to keep them for their own citizens. And there wasn’t enough domestic manufacturing to fill that gap.
The year was 2010. The president was Barack Obama. The letter writer was Mike Bowen, a Fort Worth, Texas, medical mask maker on the verge of bankruptcy after rapidly ramping up his factory to supply enough masks for the H1N1 flu just a year before. Every year, Prestige Ameritech asked the Defense Department to buy their masks, citing the Berry Amendment that dictates the military buy U.S.-made apparel. In response, the Defense Department told them their masks aren’t apparel.
Again, Prestige Ameritech was ignored. And as the pandemic rolled in, shipments of testing swabs, surgical gowns, protective masks and hand sanitizer plummeted just as demand was soaring. Countries that did make PPE required manufacturers to sell all or part of their production internally, and U.S. governors found themselves in a bidding war for what was left.
Over eight months this year, domestic manufacturing around the U.S. of medical supplies has accelerated. Hospitals and labs, even public libraries, have used 3D printers to make swabs. Needle and syringe factories are working overtime. Apparel companies are now making gowns. Alcohol distillers produce hand sanitizer.
In Fort Worth, Prestige Ameritech is focused on the moment, bracing for more mask demand as people return to school, work and indoor events. But the future looks grim. “We are likely to see person-to-person spread of the virus in the U.S. in the near future; CDC will begin to gently articulate this message into their public posture,” said a Department of Homeland Security memo.
The impact of the virus varies greatly from country to country. But it is now clear that those with well-managed, diverse and flexible supply chains were able to protect against the deadly spread in ways the U.S. failed., tracking some back to a factory in China. Dr.
“Why any individual hospital would choose to have a nurse or doctor reuse a mask today ... I can’t reconcile that for you,” he said. At the Republican National Convention in August, Trump stood before the White House and declared, “Over the next four years, we will make America into the manufacturing superpower of the world. We will … bring home our medical supply chains, and we will end our reliance on China once and for all.”
Now the Trump administration says needles and syringes are on order, but details of the contracts are shrouded in secrecy. AP and “FRONTLINE” learned that the largest has gone tothat has not yet been cleared by the FDA, according to its own website. Another firm only incorporated in May, and has never before had a government contract nor imported needles and syringes. A third contractor in August reported disruptions in its overseas supply chain.
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