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Natalie Mehra on PPE auditing and its importance to the safety of healthcare workers

Posted: May 2, 2020

(May 1, 2020)

By: Youtube

Transcript: I think on PPE, on personal protective equipment. The fact that the stockpile is not just routinely rotated through and kept up is shocking. I think we could call for something like that it be in the regular audits, the two year and the five year audits of the Auditor General in Ontario. That would ensure that the stockpiles are actually checked. I mean after SARS there was a real understanding and a deep consensus that precautionary principles should apply. That was thrown out the window at the beginning of this, and it can’t be again. So, definitely on the stockpile, on protecting access, right now, I just wanted to highlight while there have been some improvements in access to PPE it is by no means complete at this point. I think Michael can attest to this from the frontlines himself. But we’re certainly hearing also from homecare and community care right across the entire continuum of care people do not have the protection that they need. They certainly do not have access to N95 masks; in some areas, they don’t have anything and this continues. Even now, as the outbreaks continue to progress; they are still growing provincially, particularly in the facilities: hospitals, long term care, and retirement homes, and today we saw a home care worker die…again…so a very, very terrible situation that is by no means really under control yet.

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