Mass. officials: Ebola causing ’spike’ in equipment demand
State officials have heard concerns about "supply chain shortages" for personal protective equipment and are monitoring the situation as the U.S. prepares for potential Ebola cases.
Massachusetts Public Safety Undersecretary Kurt Schwartz said last week that he had heard concerns from first responders about the shortages and potential delays in receiving protective equipment.
Schwartz told a Beacon Hill panel reviewing response capabilities that the state has had initial conversations about setting up "regional capability," such as SWAT teams, that can handle the response instead of multiple fire or emergency service departments needing to be prepared to manage an Ebola patient.
Ebola has caused an "incredible spike in demand" for protective equipment, Schwartz told reporters after his testimony.
Schwartz was joined by Department of Public Health Commissioner Cheryl Bartlett and Mary Clark, director of the Office of Preparedness and Emergency Management, to testify before the Legislature's Joint Committee on Public Health.
Bartlett stressed that, so far, there have been no cases of Ebola in Massachusetts and the Bay State's risk remains low.
Bartlett and Schwartz declined to predict whether legislative appropriations will be sought for Ebola preparedness efforts, but Schwartz said those efforts have led to communities eyeing the potential repurposing of homeland security grant funds.
"Our dollars on homeland security are already stretched," he said.
Clark said the federal Centers for Disease Control has issued revised guidance for use of personal protective equipment worn by healthcare workers during management of Ebola patients. The guidance now recommends "full body coverage" to reduce risk of self-contamination, she said.
Bartlett, the outgoing public health commissioner, told lawmakers she has advised Massachusetts hospitals to review their infection-control protocols and provide preparedness training in the event of a suspected or confirmed case of Ebola.
Bartlett said she was meeting on Thursday and Friday with hospital associations to discuss her agency's plan to send staff into the field to support implementation of infection control protocols and preparedness trainings.
"We will be working closely with our providers and their frontline workers, and fellow nurses and others, and we will conduct a robust survey with them of our preparedness throughout the system," Bartlett told the committee.
Bartlett said that for someone to be considered a potential Ebola case, they must have traveled in the past 21 days to Liberia, Guinea or Sierra Leone; have had direct, unprotected blood or body fluid contact with a person sick with Ebola; and have a fever of 100.4 degrees or higher, along with a severe headache, muscle pain, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain or unexplained hemorrhage.
Bartlett told the committee that the Massachusetts State Public Health Laboratory is one of a "small number" of state laboratories that the federal Centers for Disease Control has approved for preliminary testing for Ebola.
The lab can have testing results within four to six hours of specimen being submitted, she said.
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