Interestingly the majority of responses have been from people who do not make comments and include one or two well-known figures in public life that I did not realise followed the site.
Well, you have to do something when you're recovering from a virus!
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
It’s a rum night when the most favourable newspaper headline for the government is in the Independent.
Feels like the vaccine news was dropped in to try and distract from the EU PPE decision.
The EU scheme hasn't delivered anything yet, it's not going to for a while. It's a complete distraction that people are falling for. The question is why the government has ignored legitimate offers if help from UK industry. Why have suppliers been ignored and ended up exporting the very items we're now struggling to get even after they offered them to the government. Why wasn't an industrial procurement and manufacturing assistance plan put in place. Why wasn't overseas procurement difficulty anticipated when we did anticipate it for ventilators.
And so on. There's a lot more questions to answer than whether or not we're in an EU scheme that hasn't delivered anything.
The suppliers you are reading in the press aren't manufacturers.
They are people who "know a bloke in China" who call up the government and say "Give me £5m and I'll get you the gowns, no questions asked".
You need to deal with the manufacturers direct
It's really really bad journalism to keep running with these stories. I don't know if its the press being underfunded, or mischevious or agenda driven. But it's bollocks.
It’s a rum night when the most favourable newspaper headline for the government is in the Independent.
Feels like the vaccine news was dropped in to try and distract from the EU PPE decision.
The EU scheme hasn't delivered anything yet, it's not going to for a while. It's a complete distraction that people are falling for. The question is why the government has ignored legitimate offers if help from UK industry. Why have suppliers been ignored and ended up exporting the very items we're now struggling to get even after they offered them to the government. Why wasn't an industrial procurement and manufacturing assistance plan put in place. Why wasn't overseas procurement difficulty anticipated when we did anticipate it for ventilators.
And so on. There's a lot more questions to answer than whether or not we're in an EU scheme that hasn't delivered anything.
The suppliers you are reading in the press aren't manufacturers.
They are people who "know a bloke in China" who call up the government and say "Give me £5m and I'll get you the gowns, no questions asked".
You need to deal with the manufacturers direct
It's really really bad journalism to keep running with these stories. I don't know if its the press being underfunded, or mischevious or agenda driven. But it's bollocks.
100% agenda....I looked up the company from the Telegraph's "scoop" last night and it was clear as day why the government put them on hold.
If a reality tv show contestant, who runs a property development business, demanding a load of cash upfront for some medical kit they don't yet have, are you going to buy it? Its the equivalent of doing a deal with Arthur Daly.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at how the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
If we had been in exactly this situation but with Corbyn in charge all the PB Tories and their media allies would be screaming blue murder. It's the hypocrisy I find amusing.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at how the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at how the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Didn't South Korea say it wasn't true though?
The news now comes from valid sources. South China Morning Post etc
If it is true, I wonder if Kim was done in by his doctors
Medical doctor, worked in big NHS teaching hospital, good communicator, photogenic and telegenic.
Woman? You can bet your house, you'll excuse me if I don't bet mine. I won't bother to remember to tell you and I expect you to tell me, if you can but I expect you won't.
It’s a rum night when the most favourable newspaper headline for the government is in the Independent.
Feels like the vaccine news was dropped in to try and distract from the EU PPE decision.
The EU scheme hasn't delivered anything yet, it's not going to for a while. It's a complete distraction that people are falling for. The question is why the government has ignored legitimate offers if help from UK industry. Why have suppliers been ignored and ended up exporting the very items we're now struggling to get even after they offered them to the government. Why wasn't an industrial procurement and manufacturing assistance plan put in place. Why wasn't overseas procurement difficulty anticipated when we did anticipate it for ventilators.
And so on. There's a lot more questions to answer than whether or not we're in an EU scheme that hasn't delivered anything.
Well the "suppliers" have overwhelmingly turned out to be middle men chancers with no track record,.
But the why didn't the government go all WWII,any factory that can make stuff we will buy, now that is a really good question.
Have an intern reading the emails and another one making phonecalls to assess the legitimacy. It's not a big job really.
That's what they are doing.
But instead of saying "you're a chancer, sod off" they are just ignoring them.
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
PPE is a different kettle of fish to ventilators. These are not complex machines with moving parts, they are garments. There are plenty of textile factories in the UK that make clothes to patterns.
It’s a rum night when the most favourable newspaper headline for the government is in the Independent.
Feels like the vaccine news was dropped in to try and distract from the EU PPE decision.
The EU scheme hasn't delivered anything yet, it's not going to for a while. It's a complete distraction that people are falling for. The question is why the government has ignored legitimate offers if help from UK industry. Why have suppliers been ignored and ended up exporting the very items we're now struggling to get even after they offered them to the government. Why wasn't an industrial procurement and manufacturing assistance plan put in place. Why wasn't overseas procurement difficulty anticipated when we did anticipate it for ventilators.
And so on. There's a lot more questions to answer than whether or not we're in an EU scheme that hasn't delivered anything.
Well the "suppliers" have overwhelmingly turned out to be middle men chancers with no track record,.
But the why didn't the government go all WWII,any factory that can make stuff we will buy, now that is a really good question.
Have an intern reading the emails and another one making phonecalls to assess the legitimacy. It's not a big job really.
That's what they are doing.
But instead of saying "you're a chancer, sod off" they are just ignoring them.
Said chancer then runs to the press
It reminds me of the stories they ran about some chancers saying they could get 5,000 ventilators. Nobody has managed to buy that many on the open market in one go from a single source.
Very interesting discussion regarding centralised vs decentralised testing.
Notable that the two countries most successful in testing - South Korea and Germany - adopted the latter approach, which we considered and rejected.
I have to say that the more I hear of Public Health England management, the less impressed I am.
I imagine the media reaction to the UK using a network of private testing labs wouldn't have been good.
Why ? It’s worked elsewhere - and the government’s own strategy now relies on the majority of tests being carried out by the private sector. It’s just that the system for this being carried out is centralised and inflexible.
Moving fast and making mistakes is preferable to moving slow... and making mistakes. You learn quicker.
Very interesting discussion regarding centralised vs decentralised testing.
Notable that the two countries most successful in testing - South Korea and Germany - adopted the latter approach, which we considered and rejected.
I have to say that the more I hear of Public Health England management, the less impressed I am.
I imagine the media reaction to the UK using a network of private testing labs wouldn't have been good.
Why ? It’s worked elsewhere - and the government’s own strategy now relies on the majority of tests being carried out by the private sector. It’s just that the system for this being carried out is centralised and inflexible.
Moving fast and making mistakes is preferable to moving slow... and making mistakes. You learn quicker.
Because there is this weird mentality of any use of the private sector in health care is instantly "privatising the NHS".
Germany they are perfectly comfortable with it, same in Sweden. But when Tony Blair tried to reduce waiting lists by using private providers, the media went nuts on his government.
And we have just had a GE, where every day, it was the Tories want to sell off / privatise the NHS narrative. I am going to guess PHE also not keen on losing their grip on things by bringing in outside help. Hence why they insisted on creating the test, where as in Germany, a private lab developed it and the government just bought it.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
They might have destroyed the economy though, and forced half the country’s restaurants & pubs out of business
Should they have allowed pubs and restaurants to stay open? The daily briefing would have been interesting
Very interesting discussion regarding centralised vs decentralised testing.
Notable that the two countries most successful in testing - South Korea and Germany - adopted the latter approach, which we considered and rejected.
I have to say that the more I hear of Public Health England management, the less impressed I am.
I imagine the media reaction to the UK using a network of private testing labs wouldn't have been good.
Why ? It’s worked elsewhere - and the government’s own strategy now relies on the majority of tests being carried out by the private sector. It’s just that the system for this being carried out is centralised and inflexible.
Moving fast and making mistakes is preferable to moving slow... and making mistakes. You learn quicker.
Because there is this weird mentality of any use of the private sector in health care is instantly "privatising the NHS".
They are using the private sector. They will provide the majority of Hancock’s 100k tests, if he ever gets there. They’re just doing it in the slowest way possible.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at how the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Didn't South Korea say it wasn't true though?
They said they have no reports suggesting that Kim is in grave danger, not that for example that he didn't undergo serious surgery and isn't exactly chipper. So there are shades there about what state he is in rather than contradiction in the US led stories.
Again it could be mischief but the US methodology of flying kites with some workable intelligence to flush out further info isn't unusual practice and it does have that look about it.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at how the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Didn't South Korea say it wasn't true though?
The news now comes from valid sources. South China Morning Post etc
If it is true, I wonder if Kim was done in by his doctors
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
They might have destroyed the economy though, and forced half the country’s restaurants & pubs out of business
Should they have allowed pubs and restaurants to stay open? The daily briefing would have been interesting
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
Didn't the Japanese Govt. ask people to send in their raincoats? I've got an old Burberry trench coat, still quite fetching.
It reminds me of the stories they ran about some chancers saying they could get 5,000 ventilators. Nobody has managed to buy that many on the open market in one go from a single source.
A director from Airbus gave a figure of 50 a week normally, produced by one of the UK's two main manufacturers, for the ventilator design that Airbus have helped to replicate.
This kind of spiv time wasting should be criminal.
Very interesting discussion regarding centralised vs decentralised testing.
Notable that the two countries most successful in testing - South Korea and Germany - adopted the latter approach, which we considered and rejected.
I have to say that the more I hear of Public Health England management, the less impressed I am.
I imagine the media reaction to the UK using a network of private testing labs wouldn't have been good.
Why ? It’s worked elsewhere - and the government’s own strategy now relies on the majority of tests being carried out by the private sector. It’s just that the system for this being carried out is centralised and inflexible.
Moving fast and making mistakes is preferable to moving slow... and making mistakes. You learn quicker.
Because there is this weird mentality of any use of the private sector in health care is instantly "privatising the NHS".
They are using the private sector. They will provide the majority of Hancock’s 100k tests, if he ever gets there. They’re just doing it in the slowest way possible.
They are NOW...Initially PHE insisted on re-creating a test and controlling all testing from their labs. It meant we were slower than Germany by several weeks. I bet we could have bought that tech if we wanted to.
The government clearly went along with it, because the scientists said don't need to worry about 100,000 antigen tests a day, these antibody tests will get us mass testing and way easier. But the government clearly didn't put in place a back-up plan and only now scrambling about to develop it.
I would have bought up all the unis and drug companies capacity, so what if we did get the antibody tests and it was wasted money.
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
PPE is a different kettle of fish to ventilators. These are not complex machines with moving parts, they are garments. There are plenty of textile factories in the UK that make clothes to patterns.
How many, how high volume and where do they get their raw material from?
It’s a rum night when the most favourable newspaper headline for the government is in the Independent.
Feels like the vaccine news was dropped in to try and distract from the EU PPE decision.
The EU scheme hasn't delivered anything yet, it's not going to for a while. It's a complete distraction that people are falling for. The question is why the government has ignored legitimate offers if help from UK industry. Why have suppliers been ignored and ended up exporting the very items we're now struggling to get even after they offered them to the government. Why wasn't an industrial procurement and manufacturing assistance plan put in place. Why wasn't overseas procurement difficulty anticipated when we did anticipate it for ventilators.
And so on. There's a lot more questions to answer than whether or not we're in an EU scheme that hasn't delivered anything.
Well the "suppliers" have overwhelmingly turned out to be middle men chancers with no track record,.
But the why didn't the government go all WWII,any factory that can make stuff we will buy, now that is a really good question.
Have an intern reading the emails and another one making phonecalls to assess the legitimacy. It's not a big job really.
That's what they are doing.
But instead of saying "you're a chancer, sod off" they are just ignoring them.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
If we had been in exactly this situation but with Corbyn in charge all the PB Tories and their media allies would be screaming blue murder. It's the hypocrisy I find amusing.
I think you’re probably right. To be honest though, I think this situation is so unprecedented, and still we don’t know much about the disease, that any strong criticisms of any approach are fuelled by existing bias rather than level headed assessment
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
Strange that, are we short of masks, or was it full length gowns? I walked into a chemist in the last week and they had a couple of large boxes each with lots of smaller boxes of disposable masks being unpacked, with (assumed) chinese worded packaging.
Were they for pharmacy staff? Maybe though it must be costing the staff a fortune as the pricing at the counter quoted a pound a pop for them.
It worse than that, read carefully the wording. Landcent didn't contact the UK government, a company called EFDUK LIMITED did. They have absolutely no presence, other than some basic filings with companies house.
Also, I don't believe that EcoLogix website is the right company. And again EcoLogix, according to companies house is worth all of £20k, and does bugger all business. They seems they (used) to sell eco-friendly paint stripper. Again no website that I can find.
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
PPE is a different kettle of fish to ventilators. These are not complex machines with moving parts, they are garments. There are plenty of textile factories in the UK that make clothes to patterns.
It does slightly amuse me the the angst about reusing surgical garments.
They've only moved to single use in the last 15 years or so, mainly to save money.
It worse than that, read carefully the wording. Landcent didn't contact the UK government, a company called EFDUK LIMITED did. They have absolutely no presence, other than some basic filings with companies house.
Also, I don't believe that EcoLogix website is the right company. And again EcoLogix, according to companies house is worth all of £20k, and does bugger all business.
Yes - I changed that - but the journalism is astonishingly shoddy, someone who speculatively bought a load of masks of unknown quality complain that they can't offload them to the government, presumably at a profit. The Guardian should have asked those basic questions.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
If we had been in exactly this situation but with Corbyn in charge all the PB Tories and their media allies would be screaming blue murder. It's the hypocrisy I find amusing.
I think you’re probably right. To be honest though, I think this situation is so unprecedented, and still we don’t know much about the disease, that any strong criticisms of any approach are fuelled by existing bias rather than level headed assessment
We are and there will and should be blood on the carpet after. Will the NHS hierarchy get hauled over the coals as much as the politicians? Doubt it. Of course there are lots of people working their nads off but there are some notable failures. Mistakes are gonna be made but areas with a lack of initiative, wit and imagination deserve to be called out.
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
If we had been in exactly this situation but with Corbyn in charge all the PB Tories and their media allies would be screaming blue murder. It's the hypocrisy I find amusing.
I think you’re probably right. To be honest though, I think this situation is so unprecedented, and still we don’t know much about the disease, that any strong criticisms of any approach are fuelled by existing bias rather than level headed assessment
There will obviously have to be the mother of all enquiries when we're over this. Conversations now are just tosh
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
Didn't the Japanese Govt. ask people to send in their raincoats? I've got an old Burberry trench coat, still quite fetching.
No it’s only the UK struggling to buy PPE, everyone else has loads of the stuff
That's devastating for Pelosi. Amateur hour to allow the interviewer to ask about something serious in the same interview as something trivial. It's one or the other.
So....who fancies spending a £10s million quid for medical gear sight unseen with two companies, who have no website, no clear real sales in the past few years and whose stated businesses are things like eco-paint stripper?
I think I might have more luck getting a load of masks of Delboy down the market or Arthur from the Winchester club.
Very interesting discussion regarding centralised vs decentralised testing.
Notable that the two countries most successful in testing - South Korea and Germany - adopted the latter approach, which we considered and rejected.
I have to say that the more I hear of Public Health England management, the less impressed I am.
I imagine the media reaction to the UK using a network of private testing labs wouldn't have been good.
Why ? It’s worked elsewhere - and the government’s own strategy now relies on the majority of tests being carried out by the private sector. It’s just that the system for this being carried out is centralised and inflexible.
Moving fast and making mistakes is preferable to moving slow... and making mistakes. You learn quicker.
Because there is this weird mentality of any use of the private sector in health care is instantly "privatising the NHS".
They are using the private sector. They will provide the majority of Hancock’s 100k tests, if he ever gets there. They’re just doing it in the slowest way possible.
They are NOW...Initially PHE insisted on re-creating a test and controlling all testing from their labs. It meant we were slower than Germany by several weeks. I bet we could have bought that tech if we wanted to.
The government clearly went along with it, because the scientists said don't need to worry about 100,000 antigen tests a day, these antibody tests will get us mass testing and way easier. But the government clearly didn't put in place a back-up plan and only now scrambling about to develop it.
I would have bought up all the unis and drug companies capacity, so what if we did get the antibody tests and it was wasted money.
Agreed. And if nothing else, you could have used the least crap antibody test anyway in practice run for conducting large scale testing later. The results themselves might not tell you much (though in the unlikely event of 50% of the country already having antibodies they would), but it would show up any problems in actually delivering them.
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
If some twat like me off the internet can find this shit out in 10 minutes of googling, I would have thought a journalist could...oh wait they didn't even know deaths for the past 100+ years were available from the ONS.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
I have no idea what possessed her to do that, but it is an absolute gift to GOP.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
I have no idea what possessed her to do that, but it is an absolute gift to GOP.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
Unlike HRC.
The screaming outrage about Trump stopping immigration for a few weeks is also very tone deaf. Trump can play it as necessary to protect the nation and only idiots like us aren't closing the borders.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
I have no idea what possessed her to do that, but it is an absolute gift to GOP.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
Unlike HRC.
Indeed, Hillary and Pelosi are both very rich, liberal coastal elitists, both actually effective legislators but tone deaf in terms of how to appeal to the average American.
Biden I agree has more appeal to blue collar voters and the rustbelt and adding Governor Whitmer of Michigan to his ticket will only help tilt the Democrats away from the coasts to the swing states in the MidWest
There is one overriding story, the saintly NHS has not been overwhelmed and by the looks of it will have plenty of capacity spare for a while. Remember how much some people marvelled at the Chinese built their field hospital in quick fashion? Yeah well Britain did it pretty fast too when it was under the gun
The rumours about Kim Jong Un being rather ill are interesting. The most interesting thing about it is the fact that the US are driving the detail of what might be up. Its either total mischief or they do have some decent intelligence and are trying, as is the way US intelligence often works, to push North Korea into a rebuttal through putting Kim on the telly, outputting some other response or no response (thus providing verification either way), by pushing out some specifics.
Yes, this occurred to me today
Amongst the hysterical criticisms, the British government is doing... ok.
No one has been refused treatment. Civil order has not broken down. Old people in ICUs are not being left to die without ventilators. No one has been welded into their apartment. We seem to be flatttening the curve with a somewhat less severe lockdown than Spain, Italy or France.
It’s not a wild success story, but it’s certainly not a catastrophe, in context.
Of course this is not headline news. Old rich country does ok in Global disaster.
If we had been in exactly this situation but with Corbyn in charge all the PB Tories and their media allies would be screaming blue murder. It's the hypocrisy I find amusing.
I think you’re probably right. To be honest though, I think this situation is so unprecedented, and still we don’t know much about the disease, that any strong criticisms of any approach are fuelled by existing bias rather than level headed assessment
We are and there will and should be blood on the carpet after. Will the NHS hierarchy get hauled over the coals as much as the politicians? Doubt it. Of course there are lots of people working their nads off but there are some notable failures. Mistakes are gonna be made but areas with a lack of initiative, wit and imagination deserve to be called out.
Most important to learn rather than punish, but that's not to say punish isn't in there somewhere.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
Trump lives so modestly.
It doesn't matter what Trump does. For his base (and for many wider independents) Trump is one of them who did good and made money and got rich and now lives well. He deserves his golf courses and gold plated doors.
The elite, professional, east coast liberals, lawyers and know-it-all professors on the other hand...
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
If it was the same company as the one in Lewis Goodall's tweet the wording was delicious
"we are in a position to offer you 10m masks"
Yeah right. Fell of the back of a lorry did they mate?
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
Didn't the Japanese Govt. ask people to send in their raincoats? I've got an old Burberry trench coat, still quite fetching.
No it’s only the UK struggling to buy PPE, everyone else has loads of the stuff
Really? For Christ's sake, tell HMG where to get it.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
Trump lives so modestly.
It doesn't matter what Trump does. For his base (and for many wider independents) Trump is one of them who did good and made money and got rich and now lives well. He deserves his golf courses and gold plated doors.
The elite, professional, east coast liberals, lawyers and know-it-all professors on the other hand...
Its the pretending to be somebody you aren't. Trump plays up the I am mega rich.
Boris gets all the bashing for being rich elite toff, but he just says yes and what...and the public don't appear to mind it. Where as Cameron kept trying to portray this image of being much more like the working man, and people knew it was BS and the out of touch stuff stuck far more.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
I have no idea what possessed her to do that, but it is an absolute gift to GOP.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
Unlike HRC.
The screaming outrage about Trump stopping immigration for a few weeks is also very tone deaf. Trump can play it as necessary to protect the nation and only idiots like us aren't closing the borders.
Yep.
I mean if you are sitting in a bar in Alabama and the guy on the telly says we are closing the borders because there is a plague why wouldn't you agree?
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
I have no idea what possessed her to do that, but it is an absolute gift to GOP.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
Unlike HRC.
The screaming outrage about Trump stopping immigration for a few weeks is also very tone deaf. Trump can play it as necessary to protect the nation and only idiots like us aren't closing the borders.
Yep.
I mean if you are sitting in a bar in Alabama and the guy on the telly says we are closing the borders because there is a plague why wouldn't you agree?
So....who fancies spending a £10s million quid for medical gear sight unseen with two companies, who have no website, no clear real sales in the past few years and whose stated businesses are things like eco-paint stripper?
I think I might have more luck getting a load of masks of Delboy down the market or Arthur from the Winchester club.
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
I bet the Guardian didn't do that sort of checking.
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
I have no idea what possessed her to do that, but it is an absolute gift to GOP.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
Unlike HRC.
The screaming outrage about Trump stopping immigration for a few weeks is also very tone deaf. Trump can play it as necessary to protect the nation and only idiots like us aren't closing the borders.
Yep.
I mean if you are sitting in a bar in Alabama and the guy on the telly says we are closing the borders because there is a plague why wouldn't you agree?
Cos they are all racist deplorables....
And that my friends is how one HRC lost the last election
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
PPE is a different kettle of fish to ventilators. These are not complex machines with moving parts, they are garments. There are plenty of textile factories in the UK that make clothes to patterns.
It does slightly amuse me the the angst about reusing surgical garments.
They've only moved to single use in the last 15 years or so, mainly to save money.
And now people are objecting to reusing gowns...
Actually the usage of single use gowns is still under developed in the UK with many hospitals still using single use gowns in the operating theatre.
Unlike reusable gowns used in the OT that have blood/ body fluids on them after use & need laundering before autoclaving,ICU gowns will be contaminated with droplets & light splashing, therefore could bypass the laundry process & go direct to the hospital autoclave, which would reduce turn around time.
In any case both single use & reusable are approved as per European standards.
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
I bet the Guardian didn't do that sort of checking.
I think they do know it isn't as strong a piece as they are making out, because the way the report is worded.
"Arun Prabhu, Landcent’s co-founder, said its UK partner, EFDUK, had contacted the government at the end of March offering to supply face masks,"
So they lead with these claims and repeatedly refer to this Landcent company (who are Dutch I believe), who flogs stuff like eco-toilets and anti-malaria nets. So some sense of legitimacy...then they slip in well my mate in the UK phoned the government up. And what's your mate in the UK do...well....quickly moving on....your mate's company got a website...look the government has f##ked up here, that's the story...
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
Didn't the Japanese Govt. ask people to send in their raincoats? I've got an old Burberry trench coat, still quite fetching.
No it’s only the UK struggling to buy PPE, everyone else has loads of the stuff
Really? For Christ's sake, tell HMG where to get it.
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
If it was the same company as the one in Lewis Goodall's tweet the wording was delicious
"we are in a position to offer you 10m masks"
Yeah right. Fell of the back of a lorry did they mate?
He is not going to walk it but it will certainly be very close in my view and Pelosi's luxury ice cream stock shows why the Democrats are still less able to connect with Middle America than Trump
Trump lives so modestly.
It doesn't matter what Trump does. For his base (and for many wider independents) Trump is one of them who did good and made money and got rich and now lives well. He deserves his golf courses and gold plated doors.
The elite, professional, east coast liberals, lawyers and know-it-all professors on the other hand...
Its the pretending to be somebody you aren't. Trump plays up the I am mega rich.
Boris gets all the bashing for being rich elite toff, but he just says yes and what...and the public don't appear to mind it. Where as Cameron kept trying to portray this image of being much more like the working man, and people knew it was BS and the out of touch stuff stuck far more.
Spot on - no grunt is gonna like a rich nob calling him bro'
I am going to bet that this Dutch company Landcent set up a deal with a Chinese middle man to a factory. Then they have said to his mate in the UK, do you want in on this deal? To which, he has said yes and phoned up the government to say, he might be able to get a load of masks.
So, that's at least 3 middle men, probably more, all adding mark-up on a load of masks, that they don't actually have when they try and get the government to stump up money for sight unseen.
This can't be right - competition is always the right answer, surely?
The only specific case he has is "a supplier who was in a position to offer 10m masks"
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
I just looked up the company the Guardian says could do 10m masks. They have no website or social media presence, company accounts aren't up to date and in 2018, made gross profit of £16k.
I bet the Guardian didn't do that sort of checking.
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
PPE is a different kettle of fish to ventilators. These are not complex machines with moving parts, they are garments. There are plenty of textile factories in the UK that make clothes to patterns.
It does slightly amuse me the the angst about reusing surgical garments.
They've only moved to single use in the last 15 years or so, mainly to save money.
And now people are objecting to reusing gowns...
Actually the usage of single use gowns is still under developed in the UK with many hospitals still using single use gowns in the operating theatre.
Unlike reusable gowns used in the OT that have blood/ body fluids on them after use & need laundering before autoclaving,ICU gowns will be contaminated with droplets & light splashing, therefore could bypass the laundry process & go direct to the hospital autoclave, which would reduce turn around time.
In any case both single use & reusable are approved as per European standards.
The NHS is not the most penny-wise of institutions but it takes bravery above and beyond to voice it.
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
Didn't the Japanese Govt. ask people to send in their raincoats? I've got an old Burberry trench coat, still quite fetching.
No it’s only the UK struggling to buy PPE, everyone else has loads of the stuff
Really? For Christ's sake, tell HMG where to get it.
I don't think PPE has been a particular failure of the Government - Central Government has now had to step in because of the failure of NHS Trusts to procure the necessary PPE. They were clearly given the resources to do so, and clearly just getting on the blower to the usual guy to say 'can we have 10 times our usual order please' was not going to work.
It needed a lot more work with suppliers, a lot of imagination, compromises on materials etc. Few seem to have managed that. It speaks to me of a public service where the culture is to be robotic, unimaginative, and a bit hopeless.
You're spouting your ususal Tory twaddle again @Luckyguy1983.
The idea that multiple competing NHS trusts were ever going to be the right way to procure a massive uplift in PPE is for the birds.
What was clearly needed was a co-ordinated centrally driven programme. We should be on a war footing for this.
Yup an NHS trust would never be able to incentivise a company to increase production capacity or guarantee future purchases of domestic capacity if lines are retooled at great expense. It needed and still needs a wartime procurement approach. Imagine that all components and materials need to be made in the UK and work from there as a worst case scenario. Plug in what can be got from overseas into the chain.
PPE is a different kettle of fish to ventilators. These are not complex machines with moving parts, they are garments. There are plenty of textile factories in the UK that make clothes to patterns.
It does slightly amuse me the the angst about reusing surgical garments.
They've only moved to single use in the last 15 years or so, mainly to save money.
And now people are objecting to reusing gowns...
Actually the usage of single use gowns is still under developed in the UK with many hospitals still using single use gowns in the operating theatre.
Unlike reusable gowns used in the OT that have blood/ body fluids on them after use & need laundering before autoclaving,ICU gowns will be contaminated with droplets & light splashing, therefore could bypass the laundry process & go direct to the hospital autoclave, which would reduce turn around time.
In any case both single use & reusable are approved as per European standards.
Should read 'still using reusable gowns in the operating theatre'
If the experience of Northern Ireland which has a single over arching supplies organisation across all Trusts, is reflected elsewhere in the UK there is legitimacy in those tweets. Procurement around disposable kit has been shocking because its been run according to procedures and by people who have no will/ability to try to subvert them which is exactly what needs doing.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
Didn't the Japanese Govt. ask people to send in their raincoats? I've got an old Burberry trench coat, still quite fetching.
No it’s only the UK struggling to buy PPE, everyone else has loads of the stuff
Really? For Christ's sake, tell HMG where to get it.
Comments
Being a human guinea pig doesn't pay very well.
Notable that the two countries most successful in testing - South Korea and Germany - adopted the latter approach, which we considered and rejected.
I have to say that the more I hear of Public Health England management, the less impressed I am.
They are people who "know a bloke in China" who call up the government and say "Give me £5m and I'll get you the gowns, no questions asked".
You need to deal with the manufacturers direct
It's really really bad journalism to keep running with these stories. I don't know if its the press being underfunded, or mischevious or agenda driven. But it's bollocks.
If a reality tv show contestant, who runs a property development business, demanding a load of cash upfront for some medical kit they don't yet have, are you going to buy it? Its the equivalent of doing a deal with Arthur Daly.
Rosena next Labour leader 25/1.
Value?
Medical doctor, worked in big NHS teaching hospital, good communicator, photogenic and telegenic.
That there is global bidding for disposables is clear. It also helps if you want to pay a portion upfront.
That there are actually very few actual manufacturing concerns in the UK doing this kit. The companies that say we 'can supply and no one is getting back to us', but really are just middlemanning to overseas suppliers does reflect a slice of the supply chain including some of those shouting the odds in public. There are very experienced companies in that trade used by the health service already. Is it possible some of these firms shouting the odds but with no actual manufacturing capacity can find new supply sources? Maybe but maybe not. The ones that count are the ones that have the manufacturing here or own/can make or break suppliers overseas and those are few and far between.
I'll give you one example of a small company based in England who's day to day business is totally unrelated to the medical supplies field. Yet a week ago it was touting that it could supply large quantities of hand sanitiser to private and public sector organisations.
The Turkish supplies, nothing new there with delays, other European countries have had the same problem extracting supplies.
Finally has any acute hospital actually outright run out?
What amazes me is that I haven't seen reports that government has spoken to the retail clothing supply chain titans. Their power over their manufacturing supply chain is large and it may be possible to use it. Brutal maybe but there you go.
But instead of saying "you're a chancer, sod off" they are just ignoring them.
Said chancer then runs to the press
Moving fast and making mistakes is preferable to moving slow... and making mistakes.
You learn quicker.
Germany they are perfectly comfortable with it, same in Sweden. But when Tony Blair tried to reduce waiting lists by using private providers, the media went nuts on his government.
And we have just had a GE, where every day, it was the Tories want to sell off / privatise the NHS narrative. I am going to guess PHE also not keen on losing their grip on things by bringing in outside help. Hence why they insisted on creating the test, where as in Germany, a private lab developed it and the government just bought it.
They’re just doing it in the slowest way possible.
virus bonds?
Again it could be mischief but the US methodology of flying kites with some workable intelligence to flush out further info isn't unusual practice and it does have that look about it.
https://www.dailynk.com/english/source-kim-jong-un-recently-received-heart-surgery/
This kind of spiv time wasting should be criminal.
The government clearly went along with it, because the scientists said don't need to worry about 100,000 antigen tests a day, these antibody tests will get us mass testing and way easier. But the government clearly didn't put in place a back-up plan and only now scrambling about to develop it.
I would have bought up all the unis and drug companies capacity, so what if we did get the antibody tests and it was wasted money.
https://twitter.com/BBCHelena/status/1252709766230618112?s=20
i.e. a dodgy chancer. If it was a primary manufacturer it wouldn't be described like that
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/06404818
https://landcent.nl/bio-toilet/
Were they for pharmacy staff? Maybe though it must be costing the staff a fortune as the pricing at the counter quoted a pound a pop for them.
Also, I don't believe that EcoLogix website is the right company. And again EcoLogix, according to companies house is worth all of £20k, and does bugger all business. They seems they (used) to sell eco-friendly paint stripper. Again no website that I can find.
https://twitter.com/liamyoung/status/1252568956474404864
They've only moved to single use in the last 15 years or so, mainly to save money.
And now people are objecting to reusing gowns...
I think I might have more luck getting a load of masks of Delboy down the market or Arthur from the Winchester club.
And if nothing else, you could have used the least crap antibody test anyway in practice run for conducting large scale testing later. The results themselves might not tell you much (though in the unlikely event of 50% of the country already having antibodies they would), but it would show up any problems in actually delivering them.
At least Biden understands that the rust belt working class, farm workers and unionised labour is part of his potential winning coalition.
Unlike HRC.
Biden I agree has more appeal to blue collar voters and the rustbelt and adding Governor Whitmer of Michigan to his ticket will only help tilt the Democrats away from the coasts to the swing states in the MidWest
The elite, professional, east coast liberals, lawyers and know-it-all professors on the other hand...
"we are in a position to offer you 10m masks"
Yeah right. Fell of the back of a lorry did they mate?
Boris gets all the bashing for being rich elite toff, but he just says yes and what...and the public don't appear to mind it. Where as Cameron kept trying to portray this image of being much more like the working man, and people knew it was BS and the out of touch stuff stuck far more.
I mean if you are sitting in a bar in Alabama and the guy on the telly says we are closing the borders because there is a plague why wouldn't you agree?
Utterly unfair, of course, but very effective
Actually the usage of single use gowns is still under developed in the UK with many hospitals still using single use gowns in the operating theatre.
Unlike reusable gowns used in the OT that have blood/ body fluids on them after use & need laundering before autoclaving,ICU gowns will be contaminated with droplets & light splashing, therefore could bypass the laundry process & go direct to the hospital autoclave, which would reduce turn around time.
In any case both single use & reusable are approved as per European standards.
"Arun Prabhu, Landcent’s co-founder, said its UK partner, EFDUK, had contacted the government at the end of March offering to supply face masks,"
So they lead with these claims and repeatedly refer to this Landcent company (who are Dutch I believe), who flogs stuff like eco-toilets and anti-malaria nets. So some sense of legitimacy...then they slip in well my mate in the UK phoned the government up. And what's your mate in the UK do...well....quickly moving on....your mate's company got a website...look the government has f##ked up here, that's the story...
So, that's at least 3 middle men, probably more, all adding mark-up on a load of masks, that they don't actually have when they try and get the government to stump up money for sight unseen.
https://www.extmedical.co.uk/c/face-masks.html
Could be a dropshipper based on shipping time.
Why don't the Guardian place an order to prove their point?