As the Bay Area continues to reopen, it’s seeing increases in coronavirus cases, and hospitalizations that appear to be trending upward. A big issue for hospitals has been the challenge of procuring enough personal protective gear to guard front-line workers against the virus.
Earlier in the crisis, the state asked hospitals how much PPE they had on hand, and KQED obtained the responses through a public records request. In March, about half of California hospitals said they had one to two weeks of commonly used PPE, including N95 respirators, the emblematic face mask worn by health care workers. Hospitals also told the state they were worried about their supply chains, a complex global web of manufacturers, middlemen and medical offices , which were being torn by unprecedented demand for supplies. What resulted was a patchwork response on the part of hospitals, facilities and even the state in buying enough PPE, with groups mostly competing against each other.
Read the full story from KQED’s Molly Peterson, Kevin Stark and Lisa Pickoff-White here.