More just a guy who has no clue.

Someone posted the article yesterday on the Fed Gov't working on the ventilator shortage for over a decade. Bush established the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority in 2006 to address shortage issues. Gave them funding to execute. BARDA has world recognized people leading it, today (same guy has been the leader for almost a decade). That's not an ani-Fed Gov't mindset. Quite the opposite. Obama took the ball from there, and had it for 8 years. He has never been accused of being an anti Fed Gov't person either.

Ventillator RFP hit the street in 2008. And they have spent at least $6.1M and $1.4M with the first vendor, then, for some odd reason allowed them to get out of the contract (poor contract management), before re-awarding in 2014, which apparently is a contract with very loose deliverables and penalties (that's the sourcing legal team, again poor contract) because it seems Phillips had to redevelop on their own. In any event, nothing has been delivered 12 years after first RFP. I wonder if they even got the money back in return for a fully baked design document with the first vendor.

The ventillator example is just an example of our lack of preparedness. YOu then have shortages of masks and other items. And that is just the supplies needed for reacting. I'm not even talking about investing into vaccines for Sars or Mers, which may have helped dampen the impact of this strain. But even that aside, lets talk distribution of materials. What is the officially tested practice around distirubiton and tracking of supplies during hording cases like this? Right now it seems to be pick up the phone and call someone. I mean..come on, that's ridiculous...its 2020. What about tracking the equipment so ensure someone isn't hording, or stealing from the stock room....what is the protocol for someone taking possession, and protecting the equipment and being held accountable in the field?

I just hope we learn lessons from this, and put them to practice. Also, the lack of urgency on this ventillator issue, is mind boggling. Its one item....12 years. I've seen collossal projects in IT over that period that were DEFCON 5 in terms of complexity an the number of people, security, work flows, etc, impacted, and RFPs hit the street, responses, awards, implementations...and penalties.