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Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

reuters.com

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Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#51

Post by ra5 »

epistasis wrote: post #36
nprz wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It truly is insane how quickly the severity of the crisis ramped up. Monday co-workers on slack were messaging how the flu was more of a worry, after Wednesday it was mandatory work from home. And it truly feels like medical authorities were as caught off guard as the rest of us. Who was on guard duty? Was no one monitoring the situation? No one thought to increase production of PPE or RNA tests?

Being as apolitical as possible, the fault is 100% Trump's. Our pandemic response team was gutted in Spring 2018. One of my favorite science journalists, Ed Yong, wrote this shortly after; there's a lot of contextual history before he starts spitting fire at the president's egotistic idiocy. > Yet even the U.S. is disturbingly vulnerable—and in some respects is becoming quickly more so. It depends on a just-in-time m…

I think you’re being downvoted because of that very first sentence (no matter how much I hate the guy, laying the blame 100% on his frail shoulders seems a bit hyperbolic).

But I don’t see what’s downvotable (if not agreeable) about the rest of what was said

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#52

Post by IAmEveryone »

robomartin wrote: post #40

A note for those critical about donations not coming sooner: It is important to understand hospitals and doctors could not legally use industrial N95 masks. No hospital could accept them without exposing themselves to massive litigation. I know this sounds stupid from outside the US. Sadly, this is part of our reality. The key that unlocked donations was President Trump. Upon learning of this restriction he quickly p…

> The key that unlocked donations was President Trump. Upon learning of this restriction he quickly put into place a release of liability for medical use of industrial N95 masks.

President Trump did nothing except sign the law when it came to his desk. The provision was in the “Second Coronavirus Package” that originated in the US House of Representatives. It was written by Democratic lawmakers and sponsored by Nita Lowey, a New York Democrat.

Here’s the law in question: https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6201...

This Link should take you directly to the relevant section about industrial masks: https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6201...

Here’s the vote in the House: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2020/roll102.xml All 40 “Nays” were Republican.

Here’s the Senate vote: https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_... all votes against were, once again, Republicans.

It’s also unclear what type of masks Facebook had in stock. They might have been of the medical variety for all we know. And even if not, there would not have been liability anyway: it was manufactures that were previously liable when selling the wrong type of mask to health care workers. But in Facebook donating masks, no manufacturer is part of the transaction.

I’ll not go through the rest of your half-truths, except to note that if you believe any MD can see patients in “Africa” without going through some sort of accreditation you’re wrong.

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#53

Post by _bxg1 »

jb775 wrote: post #49
epistasis wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is enough for 14 days for ~50,000 people at 1/day. It seems like huge overkill when stated as a single number, but two weeks is a reasonable amount to plan for, especially for reserves at a time when the supply chain is stressed. I wish our hospitals' administration had as much foresight. I think this crisis is making it clear that management in health care is vastly overpaid.

And it makes you wonder how exactly healthcare $$$ is flowing through the supply chain. It obviously isn't tied up in equipment inventory or logistics management. Time to shake the healthcare-costs tree and see what falls out!

I believe the healthcare system is so bloated because of a lack of competition. It made news when Trump pushed for legislation that would force hospitals to tell you how much they cost. Think about that. Setting aside all the arguments that it shouldn't be left up to the free market at all, in what world can a marketplace be healthy without something so basic as price disclosure?

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#54

Post by slg »

epistasis wrote: post #25
Aloha wrote: post #8

To all who are wondering why Facebook had masks - “To help, Facebook donated our emergency reserve of 720,000 masks that we had bought in case the wildfires continued,”

Which is enough for 14 days for ~50,000 people at 1/day. It seems like huge overkill when stated as a single number, but two weeks is a reasonable amount to plan for, especially for reserves at a time when the supply chain is stressed. I wish our hospitals' administration had as much foresight. I think this crisis is making it clear that management in health care is vastly overpaid.

>I wish our hospitals' administration had as much foresight. I think this crisis is making it clear that management in health care is vastly overpaid.

Facebook has just a tad bit more money to prepare for these remote possibilities compared with your average hospital. Plus hospitals have to justify every cost in relation to how many lives it will save. Is prepping for a once in a century pandemic going to save more lives than having an extra doctor on staff for every shift? Almost everyone would have answered no to that questions up until a few weeks or months ago.

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#55

Post by battery_cowboy »

Off topic: could HN make a rule that any questions that could be easily answered from reading the article will result in a day ban? There are way too many people here who didn't read this article ("why did they have so many masks?") and half the comments could be removed if they had!

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#56

Post by abakker »

abakker wrote: post #42
nullc wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're wearing an n95 mask for particulate pollution there isn't a particular reason why you can't reuse it. When I heard the numbers, I figured they purchased extra so they could also supply them to the surrounding community so as to avoid drama about facebook employees having masks while few others did.

I mean, they're good for 8-10 hours, but they don't last indefinitely.

Self reply to all others: try doing something that actually tests the limits a bit for health reasons. you can tell in a welding/woodshop when N95s and P100s go bad, they get physically harder to breath through after about 6-8 hours. If they don't they're not sealed well enough. they do keep working longer (probably), but they get quite a bit worse.

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#57

Post by seganddr »

epistasis wrote: post #36
nprz wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It truly is insane how quickly the severity of the crisis ramped up. Monday co-workers on slack were messaging how the flu was more of a worry, after Wednesday it was mandatory work from home. And it truly feels like medical authorities were as caught off guard as the rest of us. Who was on guard duty? Was no one monitoring the situation? No one thought to increase production of PPE or RNA tests?

Being as apolitical as possible, the fault is 100% Trump's. Our pandemic response team was gutted in Spring 2018. One of my favorite science journalists, Ed Yong, wrote this shortly after; there's a lot of contextual history before he starts spitting fire at the president's egotistic idiocy. > Yet even the U.S. is disturbingly vulnerable—and in some respects is becoming quickly more so. It depends on a just-in-time m…

"Trump disbanded NSC pandemic unit that experts had praised"

https://apnews.com/ce014d94b64e98b7203b873e56f80e9a

"Quick left amid a bitter U.S. trade dispute with China when she learned her federally funded post, officially known as resident adviser to the U.S. Field Epidemiology Training Program in China, would be discontinued as of September, the sources said. The U.S. CDC said it first learned of a “cluster of 27 cases of pneumonia” of unexplained origin in Wuhan, China, on Dec. 31."

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-china-...

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#58

Post by 8bitsrule »

epistasis wrote: post #36
nprz wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It truly is insane how quickly the severity of the crisis ramped up. Monday co-workers on slack were messaging how the flu was more of a worry, after Wednesday it was mandatory work from home. And it truly feels like medical authorities were as caught off guard as the rest of us. Who was on guard duty? Was no one monitoring the situation? No one thought to increase production of PPE or RNA tests?

Being as apolitical as possible, the fault is 100% Trump's. Our pandemic response team was gutted in Spring 2018. One of my favorite science journalists, Ed Yong, wrote this shortly after; there's a lot of contextual history before he starts spitting fire at the president's egotistic idiocy. > Yet even the U.S. is disturbingly vulnerable—and in some respects is becoming quickly more so. It depends on a just-in-time m…

Taking credit for good things that happen 'on my watch', but not bad things ... looks remarkably similar to privatizing profits and socializing costs.

Same old 3-card Monte. 'Look over here!'

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#59

Post by robocat »

robomartin wrote: post #40

A note for those critical about donations not coming sooner: It is important to understand hospitals and doctors could not legally use industrial N95 masks. No hospital could accept them without exposing themselves to massive litigation. I know this sounds stupid from outside the US. Sadly, this is part of our reality. The key that unlocked donations was President Trump. Upon learning of this restriction he quickly p…

> It is important to realize that the US healthcare system does not have an insurance problem. Politicians would have you think this is the case.

As an outsider from New Zealand, I completely believe your insurance system is a huge problem, and that belief is founded on the problems I see (not what your politicians say, I don’t know anything about them).

One major issue is linking insurance to your job. Lose your job, lose your insurance.

Our socialised healthcare has it’s issues, but I have personally seen it work again and again for my friends, acquaintances, and family.

Disclaimer: I choose to also pay for private insurance, which costs me $40 per month for a middle aged guy, to get improved private health cover. I’m not against insurance, but the US system appears completely broken to me, and the insurance structure appears to be part of that.

Re: Facebook donates emergency reserve of 720k masks

#60

Post by nikolay »

tedk-42 wrote: post #9
nikolay wrote: post #4

Why was Facebook stashing so many masks? Anyway, if they didn't donate them, the Goverment said they are gonna confiscate them, and this was already clear.

Read the article. It says why.

It doesn't explain the vast amount of masks and gloves. They were stashing. I want to see a document showing exactly when they've purchased them. I won't be surprised if it was in 2020. These masks have expiry, so, why would one company stash so many - their staff is nowhere close!
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