PM in Intensive Care...

Quote: wrencat1873 "Indeed

Patel and Hancock pretty much blaming frontline staff for using too much PPE.
True colours shining through.

The current government will NEVER admit any failure or wrong doing.

The procurement of the equipment needed here must be extremely difficult but, rather than admitting this, instead, they like to quote numbers in their 100,000's of how many pairs of gloves and aprons have been sourced.
None of this matters if the front line staff havent got protective gloves or scrubs to use. Like I said a few weeks ago, too many here are too biased or not paying attention.

In almost every briefing I've seen attended by Whitty and Vallance, they have openly and honestly referenced the global shortage of PPE and the difficulties in distribution and supply, as well as the difficulties faced by procurement. You must have somehow missed all of this. Yes, as you mention, China was in lockdown - but that's just part of the issue.

The initial issue wasn't supply, it was local distribution. We had plenty of stock but getting it out there effectively and efficiently was the challenge. Still, as of a few days ago 761 million items of PPE had been delivered to 58,000 different settings across the UK. Has it been perfect? No. Has any nation managed a perfect supply chain throughout this? No (except possibly those producing PPE en masse). Was this ever going to be perfectly managed, anywhere? No. But - not disregarding instances of shortages - have the vast majority of NHS staff had access to PPE equipment? Yes.

But let's also look at supply. The main producers of PPE - China, South Korea, Japan and others - were not only in lockdown, but they also blocked exports of PPE at various stages to protect their own interests (understandable). China even effectively nationalised the Shanghai 3M plant - and others - to prevent exports. Furthermore, China actually IMPORTED 2.5 billion pieces of PPE equipment in Feb/Mar from the EU, Australia and others - stockpiling. Add to that the billions of masks purchased by the public across Asia and later the world, and immediately available stocks are almost wiped out globally.

As an example of the challenges being faced, we have the current issue with gowns. Sufficient stock has been ordered (surprise, surprise - from China). But some has been mislabelled at source and others have failed safety tests and so supplies are low in some areas. Another example of the reliance on cheap but poor quality goods from China backfiring - as we have also seen with equipment and indeed tests across Europe, where millions of Chinese COVID19 tests had to be binned after being found to be useless.

Yes, in an ideal world every nurse, doctor, carer, etc, etc would have an unlimited supply of the very best PPE on tap - and by saying that in absolutely no way do I underestimate the challenges and dangers they are facing. Our NHS staff are outstanding and deserve every plaudit being sent their way (as well as a pay rise). But this is far from an ideal world; it's a feckin global pandemic and the entire planet is stretched. To expect everything to run perfectly is naive.

If there's one thing we must learn from this, it's that reliance on globalisation and cheap but shoddy Chinese/Asian markets is damaging. We've shipped our industries and jobs over there, leaving us exposed when it matters.