Shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE)—gloves, medical masks, respirators, goggles, face shields, gowns and aprons—are leaving healthcare workers dangerously ill-equipped to care for COVID-19 patients.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that mounting disruption to the global supply of PPE is putting lives at risk. They said that rising demand, panic buying, hoarding and misuse are creating a critical shortage.
“Without secure supply chains, the risk to healthcare workers around the world is real,” said WHO’s director-general, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “Industry and governments must act quickly to boost supply, ease export restrictions and put measures in place to stop speculation and hoarding. We can’t stop COVID-19 without protecting health workers first,”
The dire warning comes as the WHO is working with governments, manufacturers and the Pandemic Supply Chain Network to boost production and secure supplies for critically affected and at-risk countries.
The public health agency is working with the World Economic Forum to engage with the private sector to support the response.
Market manipulation is widespread. Since the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, prices of surgical masks have surged six-fold, N95 respirators have trebled and gowns have doubled.
Based on WHO modelling, an estimated 89 million medical masks are required for the COVID-19 response each month. For examination gloves, that figure goes up to 76 million, while international demand for goggles stands at 1.6 million per month.
The WHO issued a statement calling on governments to develop incentives for industry to ramp up production, as well as ease restrictions on the export and distribution of PPE and other medical supplies.
COVID-19 Risk Assessment
Last week the WHO raised its assessment of the risk of spread and the risk of impact of COVID-19 to very high at the global level.
However, the agency said there is no one-size-fits-all approach to warding off COVID-19. Different countries are facing different scenarios.
WHO is advising countries on actions they can take for each of the “three Cs” scenarios—first case, first cluster and first evidence of community transmission, said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
A report of the WHO-China Joint Mission has been published. It includes 22 recommendations for China, other affected and unaffected countries, the international community and the general public.
Ghebreyesus said the report calls for all countries “to educate their populations; expand surveillance; to find, isolate and care for every case; to trace every contact; and to take an all-of-government and all-of-society approach—this is not a job for the health ministry alone.”
Workplace Preparedness and Response Plan
There are practical steps individuals can take, and workplace can update their emergency preparedness and response plans. This WHO video Q&A featuring Dr. Rosamund Lewis provides suggestions on preparing the workplace.
