French news sites reported yesterday that many local hospitals have decided to stop using Chinese-made KN95 masks because health care workers are concerned about the effectiveness of the masks and question whether they are linked to clusters of infections in hospitals.
French investigative news site Mediapart reported yesterday that many hospitals have decided to stop using KN95 masks, under the headline “In hospitals, Chinese KN95 masks raise concerns.
Last spring, the French government purchased large quantities of KN95 masks from China because of a shortage of mask stocks. Mediapart reports that doubts about KN95 masks in China have resurfaced, with many health care workers telling reporters that the KN95 masks sent by the government are not as effective as the European FFP2 medical masks.
The Collectif Inter-Blocs (CIB) and the Inter-Urgences (IU) jointly released a national advisory report in February that found a possible link between the use of KN95 masks in China and hospital clusters of infections. Hospitals have been experiencing clusters of infections since last spring, and despite compliance with epidemiological norms, clusters have multiplied in the winter.
A public hospital in the French coastal town of Hendaye received a shipment of KN95 masks in mid-January. We immediately felt something wrong with our faces,” said a representative of the hospital’s Solidarity Union, the public health union (SUD-Santé). Fifteen days after the masks arrived, we showed up with 20 people diagnosed with Covid-19! The hospital decided in February not to use KN95 anymore because the earbands were problematic, too loose, etc.”
Of the 447 questionnaires returned, more than two-thirds of health care workers said they had used KN95, and CIB spokesman Grégory Chakir noted that it was “the wording on the packaging that made health care workers take the initiative to remind the association that it was ‘not for medical use'”. “.
On March 17 last year, the French Ministry of Public Health (SPF) placed an order with BYD, headquartered in Shenzhen, China, hoping to buy Chinese-made European FFP2 medical masks.
However, Mediapart’s investigation revealed that the Ministry of Public Health only required masks that “conform to European specifications” or “conform to Chinese KN95 equivalent” on the contract; a week later, the two parties directly revised the contract to name KN95 masks.
According to the report of the Senate Committee of Inquiry on Epidemic Management, the Ministry of Public Health was “forced to purchase 203 million KN95 masks at a high price” between February and March last year, when 500 million FFP2 masks were urgently needed.
The report questioned that even though the market for FFP2 masks is now relieved and abundant, “the government decided to continue sending KN95 masks to hospitals to clear stocks, ignoring the emergence of a more infectious variant of the virus or the increasing severity of hospital clusters of infections. Shouldn’t we prioritize FFP2 for health care workers when we get enough, and then send KN95 to groups at lower risk of infection?”
When asked by the French media, the General Directorate of Health (DGS), a subsidiary of the Ministry of Health, did not answer the question, saying only that according to an executive order, “the sending authority has the right to clear the stock until March 1, 2021.” One IU member bemoaned, “We guess that’s why KN95 continues to be sent to hospitals in large quantities, the government wants to empty the stockpile in large quantities while it still can.”
Other countries, including Spain, however, did not, and immediately after the masks became available, they resumed their European specification requirements and ordered a ban on the sale of KN95 since Oct. 1 last year, saying it was less effective than FFP2.
The report said that in writing the technical characteristics of KN95, such as filtration efficiency, are almost the same as FFP2, but many public health guidance units have now stopped issuing KN95 and believe that its effectiveness is not as good as FFP2. In addition to different test items, details and standards, one of the reasons is the degree of fit between KN95 and the face.
Chazy explains, “Colleagues across the country have the same problem with KN95: the masks do not fit all face shapes.”
Lepelletier, a professor at the Nantes Medical Center, told Mediapart that health care workers had been asked to try on masks and after doing so decided to send 100,000 KN95 sent by the Public Health Department back to storage. The same problem also occurred in several European countries, such as Belgium or the Netherlands.
Recent Comments