How we secured 11 million pieces of PPE for Arizona
When we heard the horror stories about the lack of Personal Protective Equipment for our medical professionals, we set out to do something about it.
Three months later and just as COVID-19 related hospitalizations are spiking, we’ve secured more than 11 million pieces of PPE for agencies throughout Arizona on the front lines of the pandemic.
This week, the Arizona National Guard oversaw shipments of N95 masks, isolation gowns, goggles, surgical masks, nitrile gloves and face shields to hospitals, senior living communities, health-care facilities, universities, nonprofits, fire departments, law enforcement and others.
This PPE helps address the current spike in COVID-19 rates and provide Arizona with a stockpile. But if more is needed, we will work to help procure additional supplies.
How did we do it? We created an international supply chain through our Arizona PPE Initiative, a private-sector philanthropic endeavor. We used our international business and personal connections, yet it was still an exhaustive effort to pull it off.
We worked with reputable PPE suppliers to deliver vetted equipment that complies with industry requirements. Once the protective equipment is sourced from certified manufacturers across the globe, it’s inspected and flown to the United Arab Emirates.
Once ready, the PPE is sent to Phoenix for local distribution. It’s transported to a HIPPA-compliant warehouse, where local transportation is overseen by the Arizona National Guard.
It really is challenging to secure and get quality Personal Protective Equipment to the front lines. Here is a glimpse of the hurdles we face:
Manufacturers imposed numerous restrictions on how
i
they sell PPE and to whom. This is important because counterfeit PPE is an endemic problem.
Sudden changes in criteria, inspections, customs approval, pricing and factory closings (a number of factories were red lined in one day alone), combined with severe competition with cash offers at factory doors, are causing significant insecurities for quality and delivery throughout the world.
Quality control of PPE is being compromised in an effort to meet the world's growing PPE demand as quickly as possible.
iiTherefore, a large number of products are not medical grade or are expired or damaged.
Purchasing PPE in the United States has become a competitive process, pitting local, state and federal agencies against each other and resulting in significant cost increases.
This Arizona private initiative created a new pipeline of PPE with skilled oversight across the global sourcing process. It has engaged reputable PPE suppliers to deliver vetted equipment that complies with industry requirements.
We started this effort philanthropically to provide an opportunity for Arizona agencies and organizations to access PPE at cost, avoiding the bidding
iwars seen across the country and around the world.
Our efforts are directed at a larger truth, based on two core realities that should guide Arizona moving forward.
First, COVID-19 is not going away anytime soon. And second, we have to do everything we can to deal with it in a way that saves lives — and a lot of that work will fall on the private sector.
This public health crisis could end with a vaccine to prevent the disease. Or, it could end with improved treatments that make the risk of contracting it acceptable to the general public.
We don’t really know when, or how, the next chapter of this public health crisis will evolve.
The one thing we do know is that it’s not going to happen anytime in the immediate future. So, we’re all going to have to adapt, and we’re going to have to innovate.
We have to find ways to protect our frontline medical workers and make sure the healthcare system does not get overwhelmed. We have to work together to slow the spread of the disease to help the system cope and to save lives.
Securing enough PPE for our hospitals, first responders and health-related nonprofits is a key step in this process.
But we’re going to have to continue to innovate. Privatesector businesses will have to modify their business models to operate with an indefinite focus on public health. That will require changing the ways they interact with both employees and customers.
We all have a role to play in this crisis in both protecting public health and in preserving Arizona’s economy. If we continue to work together and innovate, we’ll not only get through this crisis, we’ll be stronger for it on the other side. equipped to handle these crises alone.
Counselors and social workers must help police deescalate situations and ensure proper treatments are provided. Some responsibility for public safety and security must be shifted away from the police and more widely shared by others in society.
Focus police attention on the people and locations associated with public-safety problems, and increase the range of interventions police and others use to address those problems.
The more that police involve the affected communities in developing and implementing these interventions, the more likely it will be that those responses are fair and balanced, and perceived by the public to be so.
The more personalized that policing is — where police officers and citizens know one another as individuals — the more the public actually trusts officers. Relationships can only be forged upon mutual trust.