This week the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announced it had coordinated the shipment via air from Asia of 80 tons of personal protective equipment (PPE) for use in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, three of the states hardest hit by COVID-19. FEMA scheduled additional flights this week to transport PPE to Ohio and Illinois and delivered ventilators from the Strategic National Stockpile to some of these same states and Michigan. In a March 30 fact sheet, FEMA said its Supply Chain Stabilization Task Force was executing a “whole-of-America approach” to addressing the limited supply of critical protective and life-saving equipment. The agency’s four-pronged approach includes preservation, acceleration, expansion and allocation of currently scarce resources. (FEMA advisory, 3/30/20)
