- Joined
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22 Mar 20
@wolfgang59 saidGloves, gowns and masks are distributed equitably according to each facility's capacity and relative census.
So how is this working in US?
Are the manufacturers putting up prices?
Are states bidding against other states.
Are distribution lines criss-crossing the country like a spider's web?
I'd have thought Trump would relish taking control of the logistics.
An army perspective:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66MzAs9X-ew
Government intervention has not been especially noticeable yet. But, this is generally considered beneficial. As corporate entities, many hospitals and skilled nursing facilities have heavily relied upon local sourcing within budgetary limits. Reimbursements are promised but will likely be months in dispersal.
The picture appears grim, but things can turn on a dime.
We're hoping that the virus dies a natural death or resorts to latency by mid-summer.
The worst case scenarios are unimaginable.
22 Mar 20
The post that was quoted here has been removedYes, I was wondering what that was. I typed it into Wikipedia and it came out with Personal Protective Equipment. The only relevant Personal Protective Equipment that the Army can provide is NBC suits (Nuclear, Biological & Chemical), one of which would be handy right now, but they contain sweat which runs down to one's feet and so one sort of squelches along.
Never been in anything other than the Cadets in case the above gives anyone the wrong impression. There's a book called "The Junior Officers' Reading Club" which I got that gem from.
22 Mar 20
@deepthought saidArmy involvement would be for logistics - not supply.
Yes, I was wondering what that was. I typed it into Wikipedia and it came out with Personal Protective Equipment. The only relevant Personal Protective Equipment that the Army can provide is NBC suits (Nuclear, Biological & Chemical), one of which would be handy right now, but they contain sweat which runs down to one's feet and so one sort of squelches along.
Never ...[text shortened]... ng impression. There's a book called "The Junior Officers' Reading Club" which I got that gem from.
22 Mar 20
@wolfgang59 saidWhat's wrong with the Teamster's?
Army involvement would be for logistics - not supply.
22 Mar 20
Here's what I just love about America and the media.
We live in an era when Americans should be pulling together and working together to overcome this crisis. Leave it to a Lib news outlet, Messy-NBC, to seek out a trump basher to show what's WRONG with this America and its handling of the crisis.
And I can assure you, you'll never see a news segment showing what is working in America, in re, solving the problem.
The new Democrat credo, "Divide and Conquer".
@wolfgang59 saidThe situation is marred by typical Trump administration incompetence as well as vestiges of laissez faire philosophy.
So how is this working in US?
Are the manufacturers putting up prices?
Are states bidding against other states.
Are distribution lines criss-crossing the country like a spider's web?
I'd have thought Trump would relish taking control of the logistics.
An army perspective:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66MzAs9X-ew
Millions of PPE are required, yet there is no centralized planning despite Federal law which permits the US government to order private companies to manufacture and disburse them in emergencies. Illinois Governor Pritzker spells out the problems:
""We ... got a call this morning, before I went on the air, that we're going to receive another shipment of PPE later today or tomorrow from FEMA," he said. "But it's a fraction still of what we have requested. We need millions of masks and hundreds of thousands of gowns and gloves and the rest. And, unfortunately, we're getting still just a fraction of that."
Pritzker said that, as a result, his state has to compete on the open market — against other states — for those items. Trump has pushed for states to secure masks and other essential items on their own.
"We're all competing against each other. This should have been a coordinated effort by the federal government," he said. "And the national defense authorization that the president has to essentially push this manufacturing really hasn't gone into effect in any way. And, so, yes, we're competing against each other. We're competing against other countries. It's a ... Wild West, I would say, out there. And, indeed, we're overpaying, I would say, for PPE because of that competition."
Pritzker echoed other governors who spoke Sunday. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican, said the lack of protective equipment "is a problem that everyone's been talking about for a week."
"We pushed for action, and we are getting progress," Hogan said. "Now, it's not nearly enough, it's not fast enough, we're way behind the curve, but ... we're trying to figure out what to do moving forward. They are making progress, it's not fast enough, but on all of those things, on respirators, on PPEs, on the masks, on the tests, we're ramping up."
Hogan added that "failures were made and things should've happened sooner."
The Trump response: "Pressed further on it, Trump said, "We're a country not based on nationalizing our business" and pointed to Venezuela."
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-says-governors-shouldn-t-be-blaming-administration-coronavirus-response-n1166131
Typical.
A sudden emergency that no one is to blame for? Hardly:
"There could be a shortage of personal protective equipment, such as masks, in health care settings due to the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak, the World Health Organization, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Department of Health and Human Services reiterated today.
“Demand is up to 100 times higher than normal, and prices are up to 20 times higher,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “This situation has been exacerbated by widespread, inappropriate use of PPE outside patient care.”
https://www.aha.org/news/headline/2020-02-07-concerns-rise-ppe-shortages-coronavirus
That warning came on February 7th.
@earl-of-trumps saidHealth care professionals are begging your idiot emperor to use the legal tools he already possesses to alleviate these critical shortages:
Here's what I just love about America and the media.
We live in an era when Americans should be pulling together and working together to overcome this crisis. Leave it to a Lib news outlet, Messy-NBC, to seek out a trump basher to show what's WRONG with this America and its handling of the crisis.
And I can assure you, you'll never see a news segment showing what is working in America, in re, solving the problem.
The new Democrat credo, "Divide and Conquer".
"A long foreseen shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) — including masks, N95 respirators, and gowns — is crippling health workers’ ability to respond to the coronavirus pandemic in the United States. And as doctors and nurses are forced to reuse gear in ways that put themselves and patients at risk of infection, they’re begging the Trump administration to use readily available legal tools to solve the crisis.
In a joint March 21 letter to President Trump, the American Medical Association, the American Hospital Association, and the American Nurses Association called on the administration to “immediately use the Defense Production Act to increase the domestic production of medical supplies and equipment that hospitals, health, health systems, physicians, nurses and all front line providers so desperately need.”
The Defense Production Act of 1950, originally signed during the Korean War, gives the president the authority to demand that businesses manufacture much-needed wartime supplies. In this case, the supplies aren’t titanium artillery; they’re equipment to protect frontline health workers from a highly contagious virus. In using the DPA, the president would order “the diversion of certain materials and facilities from ordinary use to national defense purposes, when national defense needs cannot otherwise be satisfied in a timely fashion.” In other words, he would direct factories that typically make other goods to start making medical resources ASAP.
Although Trump tweeted March 18 that he had signed the DPA, he said he would only be using it in a “worst case scenario in the future.”
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
I only signed the Defense Production Act to combat the Chinese Virus should we need to invoke it in a worst case scenario in the future. Hopefully there will be no need, but we are all in this TOGETHER!
207K
5:37 PM - Mar 18, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
90.5K people are talking about this
And, when asked in a March 21 press briefing why he had not yet compelled companies to manufacture and sell supplies in accordance with the DPA, he said, “We have the Act to use in case we need it, but we have so many things being made right now by so many … they are volunteering.”
Yet the joint AHA-AMA-ANA letter makes it clear that current voluntary efforts are insufficient, and that the “worst case scenario” is already here.
“Even with the infusion of supplies from the strategic stockpile and other federal resources, there will not be enough medical supplies, including ventilators, to respond to the projected COVID-19 outbreak,” the letter reads. “We have heard of health care providers reusing masks or resorting to makeshift alternatives for masks.”
Interviews with doctors and nurses on the frontlines of the Covid-19 pandemic show that there is no time for the confusion surrounding whether Trump actually plans to use the DPA.
“We do not send troops to war with a gun to share between 20 individuals and when bullets run out, say ‘Well, you need to figure it out,’” said one nurse who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized by her hospital to speak to the media. (Many nurses who spoke with Vox for this story had been told by their managers not to speak with the media.) “We need PPE now and for months to come, and we should not be reusing supplies. It is against everything we have ever been trained as precautionary and scientifically proven as far as containment per diagnosis.”
https://www.vox.com/2020/3/22/21189896/coronavirus-in-us-masks-n95-respirator-doctors-nurses-shortage-ppe
23 Mar 20
The US is not like other countries. Our Federal government does not run our States.
New York is run by New York. Any failures in New York is squarely on the shoulders of New York.
Unlike Italy, New York is getting help from the Federal government. The EU seems to be doing nothing for Italy.
23 Mar 20
@deepthought saidPPE has been an acronym in Federal Government for years. It is being mentioned in all the safety talks we've had for the last six months.
Yes, I was wondering what that was. I typed it into Wikipedia and it came out with Personal Protective Equipment. The only relevant Personal Protective Equipment that the Army can provide is NBC suits (Nuclear, Biological & Chemical), one of which would be handy right now, but they contain sweat which runs down to one's feet and so one sort of squelches along.
Never ...[text shortened]... ng impression. There's a book called "The Junior Officers' Reading Club" which I got that gem from.
Personal Protective Equipment is any equipment meant to provide safer working conditions for those who need it. PPE includes, but is not limited to, latex or nitrile gloves, safety goggles, hard hats, any type of hazmat suit or hoods, dosimeters for nuclear plant workers and masks and gowns for healthcare providers. Hand sanitizers may also fall under this category.
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- Moves
- 41301
23 Mar 20
@suzianne saidI thought the acronym was obvious and easily deduced through context.
PPE has been an acronym in Federal Government for years. It is being mentioned in all the safety talks we've had for the last six months.
Personal Protective Equipment is any equipment meant to provide safer working conditions for those who need it. PPE includes, but is not limited to, latex or nitrile gloves, safety goggles, hard hats, any type of hazmat suit or hoods, ...[text shortened]... rs and masks and gowns for healthcare providers. Hand sanitizers may also fall under this category.