Re:The N95 mask shortage America can't seem to fix
by Spivak on Wednesday September 23, 2020 @10:27AM
(#24567454)
> Yet somehow now we can't re-tool less than 0.1% of our total industrial capacity to make PPE? That's beyond us now? Really?
Your "can't" is playing two parts here trying desperately to imply "unable" for dramatic effect but actually means "unwilling" which I think is super misleading.
Like of course we could have, but politicians were more afraid of headlines like "The government invoked DPA and spent billions to produce masks, now they're sitting in warehouses" and "N95 mask producers cash huge government checks to produce masks no one needs."
The actual politicians charged with making decisions have been (I think naively) optimistic about the pandemic and if that isn't us going back to our British roots of going to the pub and waiting for it all to blow over I don't know what is.
Your "can't" is playing two parts here trying desperately to imply "unable" for dramatic effect but actually means "unwilling" which I think is super misleading.
Like of course we could have, but politicians were more afraid of headlines like "The government invoked DPA and spent billions to produce masks, now they're sitting in warehouses" and "N95 mask producers cash huge government checks to produce masks no one needs."
The actual politicians charged with making decisions have been (I think naively) optimistic about the pandemic and if that isn't us going back to our British roots of going to the pub and waiting for it all to blow over I don't know what is.