Federal Government Seizures Of Medical Supplies Rattles Hospitals
LOS ANGELES, CA — The federal government has been quietly seizing orders of scarce medical supplies placed by hospitals preparing for coronavirus outbreaks, raising questions about how the equipment is being distributed, it was reported Wednesday.
The Los Angeles Times interviewed officials at hospitals and clinics in seven states, who claim their orders for supplies were seized by the federal government without explanation. President Donald Trump has directed individual states to acquire what medical supplies they can, leaving states competing for scared medical supplies during the pandemic. According to the Times, the Federal Emergency Management Agency is not publicly reporting the acquisitions, despite spending millions of taxpayer dollars on them. They mystery leaves medical providers and state leaders in the dark about where the desperately-needed materials are going, how public funds are being spent, and whether they are being distributed fairly.
Suspicion about the federal distribution of medical supplies has been high since last month when President Donald Trump said he told Vice President Mike Pence, who heads the White House coronavirus task force, to avoid calling Democratic governors who have been critical of his administration's response to the pandemic. "If they don't treat you right, I don't call," he said.
The administration has not detailed how it decides which supplies to seize and where to reroute them, according to The Times.
The equipment seizures are leaving medical providers across the country in the dark about how they can get what they need to deal with the coronavirus pandemic. Officials who've had materials seized also say they've received no guidance from the government about how or if they will get access to the supplies they ordered. The administration has not said what supplies are going to what states.
"In order to have confidence in the distribution system, to know that it is being done in an equitable manner, you have to have transparency," said Dr. John Hick, an emergency physician at Hennepin Healthcare in Minnesota who has helped develop national emergency preparedness standards through the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine.
The medical leaders on the front lines of the fight to control the coronavirus and keep patients alive say they are grasping for explanations. "We can't get any answers," said a California hospital official who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation from the White House. In Florida, a large medical system saw an order for thermometers taken away. And officials at a system in Massachusetts were unable to determine where its order of masks went.
"Are they stockpiling this stuff? Are they distributing it? We don't know," one official said. "And are we going to ever get any of it back if we need supplies? It would be nice to know these things."
PeaceHealth, a 10-hospital system in Washington, Oregon and Alaska, had a shipment of testing supplies seized recently.
"It's incredibly frustrating," said Richard DeCarlo, the system's chief operating officer. "We had put wheels in motion with testing and protective equipment to allow us to secure and protect our staff and our patients," he said. "When testing went off the table, we had to come up with a whole new plan."
City News Service and Patch Staffer Paige Austin contributed to this report.
This article originally appeared on the Hollywood Patch
