True and brief
, I work for a company the State of CA has deemed essential, and I perform an essential function. So I am splitting time between my place of work and home. I do the hands-on stuff I can't do at home in the "office", and do computer work at home. My company requires people working in company buildings to wear masks, and has supplied the masks (not N95, but still some degree of perfection, since two people wearing masks is a double barrier. Companies are required to provide the PPE the companies deem required.
The PPE shortages had two major causes:
* A massive surge in demand;
* The country where a large % of PPE is manufactured, China, lied to the world about the epidemic - delayed announcing the outbreak, delayed announcing the type and DNA sequence of the virus, lied about whether human-human transmission was happening - for some 5 weeks, in which time China shut down exports of PPE and scooped it up for internal use. Regardless of how one feels about China's shenanigans, the net result was that the supply of PPE was severely diminished during a time of massive demand surge.
A third significant/major cause of the shortages was the Obama Administration's failure to replenish national stockpiles after the 2009-2010 H1N1 epidemic and similar failures to stockpile by various states and major cities.
Then there's the FDA's years-long slow-walking of the approval for full volume use of a process that disinfects masks and other PPE for re-use.
