Forum Topic

£1.4 billion of PPE destroyed.....

While the "children" play and gamble on dates of next election , not much fuss has been made about the £1.4b worth of PPE provided by Full Support Healthcare being destroyed yesterday....  Priorities, what? https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/ppe-wes-streeting-northamptonshire-daisy-cooper-bbc-b2568464.htmlhttps://www.thetimes.com/uk/society/article/government-destroys-14bn-of-ppe-bought-from-single-company-tz5fc0w57https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cll476qzm85ohttps://www.thenational.scot/news/24411533.government-destroys-1-4-billion-ppe-bought-tories-pandemic/

Ivonne Holliday ● 364d8 Comments

How first world when we had people here using bin bags and had to mobilise everybody who could sew to make scrubs and all the schools and colleges' art departments and architects' offices with 3D printers making masks.  As with many illnesses the higher the amount of exposure you had to it the greater the chance of catching it and when you are overworked and tired then your resistance is lowered.  We lost a lot of medical staff and many more became exhausted and burnt out.

Philippa Bond ● 362d

Part of the "consignment" was dumped, yes, fly tipping anyone, somewhere in the New Forest and another in Somerset sometime in 2001.The PPE was, in fact, delivered during COVID but declared unuseable. Therefore, it was dumped. GRRRR!£1.4bn would go a long way to pay for extra nurses.Accountability is a must!

Ivonne Holliday ● 363d

As you say, it's not going to be done overnight.There are many factors at play:* Is it still in date (PPE has something like a best-before or use-by date - I'm not sure which but it doesn't last forever)?* Individual items have different shelf lives.* It looks to be stored outside, much of it may be unusable now - but that could just be stock photography* Is it needed (e.g. if kept would it just go beyond its service date before it was used anyway)?* If its usable and we don't need it, can it be sold/sent elsewhere?* If it could be salvaged would it future orders with existing suppliers could be affected? (Not putting in ongoing/future orders could affect the future supply chain.)It mostly boils down to general supply chain and logistics management. If something has a ~2 year shelf life and you want a maximum store of it then you need to work out how to store something near ~24 months of it so that you can ship out the oldest stuff (that's still within date) when the new stuff comes from the suppliers.The closer you get your store to the shelf life of the product the more it costs. The sums are big but not too big in terms of national budgets. PPE storage costs in the UK were something like £312million in 2022, but it is the price you pay for being ready for much increased demand such as during the pandemic.Slash storage to the minimum and you get caught very short in times of dire need. And that's what the previous Government unfortunately did in the run up to the pandemic. They then swung massively in the opposite direction (including some very dodgy deals through the VIP channels) and we're paying massively for that too.

John Kettlekey ● 363d

Thanks, Andy 

Michael Ixer ● 363d

I understand there is a destruction plan but it will takes months and months to destroy it all. So in a weeks time it could be stopped, if the will is there.

Andy Pike ● 364d

Aren't they destroying it at present, a bit difficult to reverse! I wonder why they're rushing it though before a new government possibly takes over. The cynic in me wonders what they're trying to hide ...

Michael Ixer ● 364d

PhillipaAny incoming government will be able to review and amend this decision on day1 .But they will have to do the same as the current government . Check that the PPE is still in a usable condition and has not degraded then look at the cost of storing any equipment they decide to keep and then come to a decision of how much should they maintain on an ongoing basis and how much they spend going forward on  replenishing the stock as parts become obsolete etc. And storing the stock for a maybe disaster.How long do you store a billion pieces of equipment that may never be needed.Preparation for a possible disaster is extremely difficult and knowing what stock levels to keep for an unknown foe is something no one will ever get right.

Andy Pike ● 364d

Are they trying to make sure an incoming Govt will be as unprepared as they were for an expected-sometime-pandemic?  Is an outgoing regime trying to cause as much irrepairable damage as possible in sabotaging the infrastructure and risking further destroying the country's health and wellbeing?Cows now have Covid in America and there are rising cases of mpox here.  Let alone anything else such as the lifestyle diseases we may have acquired in this rich first world country of over-indulgence and lack of exercise!Will a Govt be caught out once again because Just-In-Time just isn't?  Why should our medical staff be put in the position of having to use binliners to try and protect both their own and the lives of others because they have no PPE?  The sooner that the gambling risk-takers go the better.

Philippa Bond ● 364d