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The Epoch Times

@EpochTimes

Hundreds of #Ventilators owned by #NewYorkCity—purchased for an emergency stockpile in 2006 by then-Mayor @MikeBloomberg

—were auctioned off at least 5 years ago under the administration of Mayor @BilldeBlasio

, according to reports.

NYC Auctioned Off Stockpiled Ventilators Meant for a Pandemic: Report

Hundreds of ventilators owned by New York City as part of its emergency stockpile were auctioned off at least five years ago under the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio, according to reports.

theepochtimes.com

8:34 PM · Apr 8, 2020

https://www.theepochtimes.com/nyc-auctioned-off-stockpiled-ventilators-meant-for-a-pandemic-report_3303124.html

NYC Auctioned Off Stockpiled Ventilators Meant for a Pandemic: Report

Hundreds of ventilators owned by New York City as part of its emergency stockpile were auctioned off at least five years ago under the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio, according to reports.

The ventilators, and “a supply of facemasks,” were purchased by the city in 2006 under then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg as a measure to prepare New York City to handle a potential pandemic, akin to the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic.

However, the ventilators were later auctioned off because the health department “couldn’t afford to maintain them” when they broke down, according to an investigation by ProPublica.

CCP VIRUS SPECIAL COVERAGE

At the time of the purchase, a new strain of flu had emerged in Asia, the news outlet reported, citing a 2006 report from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. The report (pdf) stated that the city should have on hand thousands of additional ventilators to treat patients should a pandemic arise.

“Since the pandemic will be widespread in the United States, the supplies from the federal Strategic National Stockpile may not be available and local caches will need to be relied upon,” the report said.

New York City then acquired 500 ventilators but auctioned them off some time before 2016 because it couldn’t afford to maintain the machines—the model of which ceased production after 2009, according to the report.

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New York City also planned to acquire 1.1 million N95 face masks for use in a pandemic. However, it ended up purchasing just 216,000 due to reduced funding. The department said the masks “eventually all expired” and it became “cost-prohibitive to replace them in any meaningful quantity.”

The news comes as the city struggles with a shortage of critical medical supplies for health care workers and first responders amid the CCP virus pandemic, which has resulted in deaths surpassing 4,000 in New York City alone as of press time, according to a tracking map by Johns Hopkins University that collates official government data.

New York state has become the America’s CCP virus epicenter, with a cumulative death toll of 5,489. The United States has recorded almost 400,000 infections; well over a third of those are in New York state alone.