News & Media
Coronavirus April 3 Update: Stress on the National Stockpile, New Crackdowns on Price Gouging and Hoarding, and FDA Eases Some Restrictions
House panel releases documents about stress on the national medical stockpile
Documents released by the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Thursday give a dire look at the shape of the National Strategic Stockpile of critical medical supplies. Several states and the District of Columbia have only received a fraction of the supplies they've requested.
According to documents provided by the committee, states in Federal Emergency Management Agency Region III, which includes much of the Mid-Atlantic, requested 5.2 million N95 respirator masks, but received less than 10 percent of them. These states also received less than 1 percent of the gloves they asked for and no body bags.
"The new documents we are releasing today confirm the urgent warnings we have been hearing from our nation's governors and health care professionals for weeks -- they do not have enough personal protective equipment and medical supplies, and the Administration has provided only a tiny fraction of what they desperately need," said House Oversight and Reform Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney in a statement.
The latest White House COVID-19 updates
Vice President Mike Pence announced Thursday that guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention regarding mask use would be coming in the next several days. The White House also announced how much protective medical equipment it has given to states from the strategic stockpile.
During Thursday's daily coronavirus briefing, Rear Adm. John Polowczyk, the supply chain stabilization task force lead, said the federal government has provided 27.1 million surgical masks, 19.5 million N95 masks, 22.4 million gloves, 5.2 million face shields, and more than 7,600 ventilators to state governments.
When pressed on whether supplies were truly getting to states and governors who request them, Polowczyk said he was confident that states' requests would not be ignored. "We're marrying where CDC, where the demand for COVID is, with what’s in the commercial system," he said. "We're making allocations to those with the most pressing need."
The White House also announced new guidelines Thursday to protect seniors in nursing homes. The guidelines instruct nursing homes to have the same staff care for the same group of residents to minimize the potential spread of COVID-19. President Donald Trump said the guidelines urge facilities to provide separate areas for healthy and sick residents.
Trump also announced that he has instructed Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert Wilkie to extend deadlines for benefits and to postpone debt collections for residents.
Administration cracks down on price gouging, hoarding
The Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice announced plans to distribute hoarded personal protective equipment they have discovered to those on the front lines of the COVID-19 crisis in New York and New Jersey.
The PPE, which includes about 192,000 N95 respirator masks, 598,000 medical grade gloves, 130,000 surgical masks, and other critical supplies, were found by the COVID-19 Hoarding and Price Gouging Task Force on Monday. HHS will pay market-value for the items and distribute them to health care workers.
"This is the first of many such investigations that are underway," said Peter Navarro, Defense Production Act policy coordinator and assistant to the president. "All individuals and companies hoarding any of these critical supplies, or selling them at well-above-market prices, are hereby warned they should turn them over to local authorities or the federal government now or risk prompt seizure by the federal government."
FDA eases restrictions on LGBT men donating blood
The Food and Drug Administration announced on Thursday it would ease a series of restrictions related to the donation of blood as the need for blood donations has increased in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The changes include decreasing the required window for men who have sex with men—or women who have sex with such men—to donate blood from 12 months after the last sexual interaction to only 3 months.
Peter Marks, director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, left the door open for additional changes down the road, but on an advocacy call on Thursday gay-rights groups such as the Human Rights Campaign and Lambda Legal said the changes do not go far enough to reduce stigma.
The FDA plans also to change restrictions on individuals who recently received tattoos or piercings, traveled to certain countries affected by malaria or parts of Europe affected by Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease or Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease.
The FDA also acknowledged during a separate press call that COVID-19 is unlikely to spread through food and that food shortages are unlikely.
"Let me assure you that the FDA is committed to protecting the health of the American people and facing any challenges that might arise during this crisis. This includes ensuring that the food supply chain remains safe during the crisis and that the food supply chain from farm to table is not disrupted," said Frank Yiannas, Food and Drug Administration deputy commissioner of food policy and response. Yiannas said there is no evidence that the COVID-19 virus is transmitted by food or food packaging (view FDA assurances and public safety announcement).