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Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic
This study investigates the forces that contributed to severe shortages in personal protective equipment in the US during the COVID-19 crisis. Problems from a dysfunctional costing model in hospital operating systems were magnified by a very large demand shock triggered by acute need in healthcare a...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Elsevier Inc.
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7531934/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33017601 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ypmed.2020.106263 |
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author | Cohen, Jennifer Rodgers, Yana van der Meulen |
author_facet | Cohen, Jennifer Rodgers, Yana van der Meulen |
author_sort | Cohen, Jennifer |
collection | PubMed |
description | This study investigates the forces that contributed to severe shortages in personal protective equipment in the US during the COVID-19 crisis. Problems from a dysfunctional costing model in hospital operating systems were magnified by a very large demand shock triggered by acute need in healthcare and panicked marketplace behavior that depleted domestic PPE inventories. The lack of effective action on the part of the federal government to maintain and distribute domestic inventories, as well as severe disruptions to the PPE global supply chain, amplified the problem. Analysis of trade data shows that the US is the world's largest importer of face masks, eye protection, and medical gloves, making it highly vulnerable to disruptions in exports of medical supplies. We conclude that market prices are not appropriate mechanisms for rationing inputs to health because health is a public good. Removing the profit motive for purchasing PPE in hospital costing models, strengthening government capacity to maintain and distribute stockpiles, developing and enforcing regulations, and pursuing strategic industrial policy to reduce US dependence on imported PPE will help to better protect healthcare workers with adequate supplies of PPE. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7531934 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | Elsevier Inc. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-75319342020-10-05 Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic Cohen, Jennifer Rodgers, Yana van der Meulen Prev Med Review Article This study investigates the forces that contributed to severe shortages in personal protective equipment in the US during the COVID-19 crisis. Problems from a dysfunctional costing model in hospital operating systems were magnified by a very large demand shock triggered by acute need in healthcare and panicked marketplace behavior that depleted domestic PPE inventories. The lack of effective action on the part of the federal government to maintain and distribute domestic inventories, as well as severe disruptions to the PPE global supply chain, amplified the problem. Analysis of trade data shows that the US is the world's largest importer of face masks, eye protection, and medical gloves, making it highly vulnerable to disruptions in exports of medical supplies. We conclude that market prices are not appropriate mechanisms for rationing inputs to health because health is a public good. Removing the profit motive for purchasing PPE in hospital costing models, strengthening government capacity to maintain and distribute stockpiles, developing and enforcing regulations, and pursuing strategic industrial policy to reduce US dependence on imported PPE will help to better protect healthcare workers with adequate supplies of PPE. Elsevier Inc. 2020-12 2020-10-02 /pmc/articles/PMC7531934/ /pubmed/33017601 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ypmed.2020.106263 Text en © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active. |
spellingShingle | Review Article Cohen, Jennifer Rodgers, Yana van der Meulen Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title | Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_full | Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_fullStr | Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_full_unstemmed | Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_short | Contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_sort | contributing factors to personal protective equipment shortages during the covid-19 pandemic |
topic | Review Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7531934/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33017601 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ypmed.2020.106263 |
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