![]() Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before being transferred to the assistant secretary for preparedness and response in the Department of Health and Human Services in 2018. But some details are available in journalistic accounts and governmental reports, including the existence of at least six large warehouses scattered in different parts of the country. The overall contents of the national stockpile are classified, as are its locations. This is a matter of collective judgment rather than technical calculation. The question of what to store in case of an emergency points to a broader issue: how security and health officials decide which threats are most urgent to prepare for. As a scholar who focuses on the role of expert knowledge in addressing an uncertain future, I have long been interested in how decisions are made about what to put into the Strategic National Stockpile. Meanwhile, there are plenty of things in the stockpile that aren’t particularly helpful right now – botulism antitoxin, for instance, and millions of doses of smallpox vaccine. It is clear that the national stockpile does not have nearly enough of such supplies to meet the present need. Hospitals and first responders have faced dire shortages of critical equipment such as ventilators and protective masks. Much of the discussion concerns its shortcomings. As the COVID-19 crisis unfolds, Americans have been hearing a lot about an obscure but vast federal trove of emergency supplies, the Strategic National Stockpile. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |