Donald Trump keeps coming up with excuses for why the federal government is not providing medical professionals with the protection they need as they fight coronavirus. And other groups keep coming up with the N95 masks that are so badly needed. On Thursday, SEIU-UHW, a union representing healthcare workers, announced it had located 39 million N95 masks, which were sitting in a medical supplier’s warehouse in Pennsylvania.
The union made call after call until they found a company that had one of the pieces of equipment that’s so desperately needed. While, it cannot be emphasized enough, Donald Trump makes excuses.
The supplier with the 39 million masks is now selling them to the state of California, several California healthcare providers, and the Greater New York Hospital Association. In California, SEIU-UHW workers will benefit directly by having more of the protective gear they need. But, as the union’s president said in a statement, “While we are pleased with these initial results, we recognize they are stopgap measures in light of the estimated 3.5 billion masks that could be needed during this pandemic. We urgently need the federal government to step in and drive a coordinated national response to the PPE shortage.”
SEIU-UHW wasn’t the only organization stepping up to find masks. Building trades unions previously donated masks their workers use to protect themselves on the job. In Washington, D.C., the head stonemason at the National Cathedral remembered a stash of thousands of masks, which the cathedral donated. Goldman Sachs is the latest company to donate hundreds of thousands of masks out of its own disaster preparedness supply. And more local organizations are scraping together every last mask and other protective gear they can and sending them to their local hospitals—like Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School in Northampton, Massachusetts, which donated 215 masks along with safety glasses and other protective equipment.
Across the country and from the most massive corporations to small organizations, people are working to equip our medical professionals to stay safe and treat us when we get sick. And with the resources of the federal government at his disposal, Donald Trump just keeps failing to deliver that kind of care for public health and safety.
This article was originally published at Daily Kos on March 26, 2020. Reprinted with permission.
About the Author: Laura Clawson is a Daily Kos contributor at Daily Kos editor since December 2006. Full-time staff since 2011, currently assistant managing editor.
