One of the warehouses the place stockpiled medication, and medical provides, are stored.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Responses
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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Responses
One of the warehouses the place stockpiled medication, and medical provides, are stored.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Responses
Surges in COVID-19, the flu and different respiratory sicknesses are forcing the U.S. authorities to do one thing it usually reserves for emergencies: launch hoards of stockpiled Tamiflu to states in dire want of extra flu medication.
The transfer from the Department of Health and Human Services on Wednesday got here by way of the Strategic National Stockpile (SNS), which permits the federal government to faucet its reserves of drugs and different medical provides when a mass outbreak or different well being disaster happens.
It’s true. There is a community of warehouses, every the scale of a number of Walmart Supercenters, positioned in top-secret places throughout the nation. And whereas a lot concerning the stockpile stays a secret, it continues to play a significant function within the COVID pandemic.
Here’s what we all know concerning the multibillion-dollar stock of vaccines, gear and different medical provides designed to assist save lives.
What type of provides does the SNS stockpile?
In brief, just about any medical provides that might be helpful throughout a mass outbreak or well being disaster.
The Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR), a division of HHS, particulars a few of the stock on its web site:
There are 1,960 containers of nerve agent antidotes, often called chempacks, in case of a chemical incident, in additional than 1,340 places, corresponding to fireplace stations and hospitals, throughout the U.S. More than 90% of Americans stay inside an hour of one among these places, in keeping with ASPR.
If a pure catastrophe or one other disaster impacts the variety of hospitals or quantities of medical gear obtainable, the SNS can deploy “quickly deployable caches” that include a mattress and different medical provides. Each of those federal medical stations can home 50 to 250 sufferers and comes with sufficient pharmaceutical provides to final for 3 days.
The SNS additionally says it has “tens of millions of masks, gloves, robes, N95 respirators, face shields and different vital provides” and 16 totally different fashions of ventilators on the prepared for these with COVID.
What is the purpose of stockpiling a lot medication?
The SNS is meant to be there in case we’d like it. By having so many medical provides in its reserves, the nation is meant to assist when native businesses run out, or when huge quantities of medical provides are wanted at a second’s discover.
The SNS “serves because the nation’s repository of medicines and provides to be used if there’s a public well being emergency, corresponding to a terrorist assault, flu outbreak, or pure catastrophe, extreme sufficient to trigger native provides to expire,” in keeping with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
When did the U.S. authorities begin doing this?
Congress licensed the creation of the SNS, then often called the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile, in 1999, the CDC says.
The federal authorities initially created the SNS to fight chemical or organic assaults. It has since been used to assist with outbreaks, such because the Ebola virus and monkeypox (now known as mpox), however officers started to pay attention to its use when the pandemic led to drastic shortages of essential medical provides.
But regardless of its creation, finances cuts, points with the worldwide provide chain and manufacturing issues made the SNS ill-equipped to cope with the pandemic, in keeping with an NPR investigation. Even 9 months into the pandemic, the investigation discovered, the SNS nonetheless lacked essential medical provides.
Most not too long ago, an October 2022 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office discovered that the SNS failed to provide the nation with sufficient sources to battle the pandemic.
“The COVID-19 response has additionally been a catalyst for HHS to re-examine SNS operations, together with the function, duties, experience, and stock wanted shifting ahead,” the GAO report mentioned.
What can we learn about these warehouses?
Imagine an enormous warehouse full of cabinets and cabinets of medical provides so far as the attention can see.
The places of the warehouses are a secret. But over time, officers have shared some details about their dimension — and stock.
In 2016, NPR’s Nell Greenfieldboyce was given a take a look at one of many huge warehouses. Greg Burel, then the SNS director, advised her that the stockpile stock was price about $7 billion — a large enhance from the allotted finances of $50 million again in 1999.
