Medical Supply Chains

Relief package billions can’t buy hospitals out of shortages

The billions of tax dollars headed for hospitals and states as part of the $2.2 trillion coronavirus response bill won’t fix the problem facing doctors and nurses: a critical shortage of protective gowns, gloves and masks.

Published March 29, 2020

In this March 12, 2020, file photo, health care personnel test a person in the passenger seat of a car for coronavirus at a Kaiser Permanente medical center parking lot in San Francisco. The Associated Press has found that the critical shortage of testing swabs, protective masks, surgical gowns and hand sanitizer can be tied to a sudden drop in imports of medical supplies. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)

More Medical Supply Chains Stories

Why was the United States left scrambling for critical medical equipment as the coronavirus swept the country? An investigation into the fragmented global medical supply chain and its deadly consequences. Streaming now.

Medical supply chains are the fragile lifelines between raw materials and manufacturers overseas, and health care workers on COVID-19 front lines in the U.S. As link after link broke, the system fell apart. This catastrophic collapse was one of the country’s most consequential failures to control the virus.