SALEM, Ore. — The U.S. government is rushing protective equipment to states, packing dozens of flights and hundreds of trucks with supplies for medical workers who will be on the front lines of the coronavirus fight.
But the pandemic has exposed some of the stockpile’s shortcomings: The cache isn’t designed to be a long-term solution to monumental demand, and some state officials are complaining that the deliveries are falling far short of what’s needed or include expired items.
The Strategic National Stockpile was created in 1999 to respond to bombings and biological, chemical and nuclear attacks. It maintains caches of pharmaceuticals, medical supplies and vaccines in secret locations around the nation.
It has never confronted anything on the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The first real use came in the anthrax-by-mail attacks following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but it was the 2009 H1N1 pandemic that prompted the largest use to date, said Christopher McKnight Nichols, associate professor of history at Oregon State University.
“The SNS as designed and funded cannot and will not be able to fully accommodate the needs of the entirety of the American people,” Nichols said. The system “is designed to help buy time” and prioritize areas of greatest need, he explained.
When the virus first hit the U.S., federal officials did focus on a hot spot: the Seattle area.
The country’s first coronavirus death occurred there on Feb. 29. That same day, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee requested almost one-quarter million N95 respirator masks, which fit tightly to the face, and 200,000 surgical masks. which are less protective than respirators but still deemed acceptable by federal health officials when N95 masks are unavailable. The governor also asked for 5,000 eye protectors, 60,000 disposable gowns and 70,000 pairs of gloves.
Six days later, the shipment came in.
“They met our entire request,” said Mike Faulk, a spokesman for Inslee.
A second order resulted in the delivery of more N95 respirators and other equipment, Faulk said. But since then, Washington has received only about 25 percent of requested items, said Jessica Baggett of the state’s joint information center.
Other states haven’t gotten what they wanted.
“If anyone in the Trump administration is listening, I want to say this very loudly and clearly: We need a better response from the federal government,” Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo, a Democrat, told a news conference Monday. “We need faster access to our personal protective equipment, masks, goggles, gloves, etc., to protect our frontline health care workers. I am out of patience at this point.”
The state requested hundreds of thousands of respirators, surgical masks, gloves and other protective equipment from the stockpile and received a quarter of that request, said Joseph Wendelken, spokesman for the Rhode Island Department of Health.
On March 3, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown asked for 400,000 respirator masks plus gowns, gloves and disposable protective suits, and up to 100 breathing machines in case the outbreak gets out of control. Her office was told Thursday that Oregon would be getting less than one-tenth the requested number of respirator masks, some other gear and no ventilator machines.