How many medical masks do we need and how many do we have to protect us from coronavirus?

It may seem like a straightforward question, but front-line doctors and nurses say they haven’t gotten an answer from federal and provincial health officials.

The Star has surveyed Ottawa and the four provinces with the largest number of confirmed COVID-19 cases, British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec, but none would share information about their inventories of surgical masks and N95 respirators.

The closest an authority came to providing a sense of supply and demand of basic personal protective equipment (PPE) was how long their existing supplies were expected to last — a month for Alberta and six to 14 days for Quebec.

While PPE inventory is a moving target as it is so dynamic, especially in the wake of the pandemic, front-line health-care professionals said the lack of transparency has made life more difficult for them.

“We’ve been asking across the country for accountability and transparency, making sure that no one is exaggerating the supply and demand question,” said Linda Silas, president of the 200,000-strong Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions.

“It’s a way of making sure health-care workers are cautious when we use them. It’s very nerve-wracking for us to hear a premier saying, ‘I think we only have supplies for so many days.’ Well I’m working next weekend.”

The availability of surgical masks and the more sophisticated N95 respirators has been the focal point of many media briefings since the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, with every country scrambling to amass PPE to fight the spread of the virus.

Last week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau vowed Canada would receive “millions” of masks after U.S. President Donald Trump ordered that masks and other PPE made by U.S.-based company 3M not be exported. The Star reached out to the Public Health Agency of Canada last week, as well as its provincial counterparts in Quebec, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia about their inventories and how the masks would be distributed.

“PHAC is aware of provincial and territorial critical requests, but does not track provincial and territorial inventories. Additionally, some provinces and territories have also pursued their own supply orders in addition to the federal/provincial/territorial bulk procurement efforts,” said a spokesperson for the Public Health Agency of Canada.

“Bulk orders of PPE such as masks are being sourced from a variety of locations. Given global demands, delivery dates are evolving. PHAC is working collaboratively with the provinces and territories to meet critical needs and collectively respond to COVID-19.”

Both Quebec’s Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux and Alberta Health did reveal how long their supplies would last, and B.C. said it had received more than “one million pieces of PPE” and expected to get more. However, none of the four provinces would share the number of masks they needed.

“The main challenges lie in terms of availability due to strong global demand and the delivery of goods,” said Quebec’s health services. “We work with the federal government, the network’s three distributors of personal protective equipment, and foreign suppliers to ensure continuous supply. Deliveries are received every day and are redistributed in the network as needed.”

The B.C. Health Ministry said it couldn’t disclose how long its inventory would last because “the province is constantly replenishing, utilizing and recycling inventory of PPE.”

In Ontario, Health Minister Christine Elliott has issued an order requiring health-care providers to provide information relating to their PPE inventories to Ontario Health on a daily basis, said a ministry spokesperson, adding that resources are allocated based on needs.

Sohail Gandhi, president of the Ontario Medical Association, said the PPE supply and allocation is the one question that comes up the most in their conversations with health authorities.

“Trying to get a line of sight has been a huge challenge for me and I don’t know whether the inventory is in a factory, in a warehouse or a truck. I don’t know that inventory is going to be distributed,” said Gandhi, whose association represents 44,000 members, including 32,000 practising physicians.

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“People want to be told the truth. Certainly physicians do. That kind of transparency is important at all times for the public. The transparency is improving but it is not quite where we want it to be.”

He said there should be a government central server where all physicians — whether they work in nursing homes, hospitals or private practices — can access the latest status of the PPE inventory.

“I’m not saying it should be instantaneous, but 48 hours (of time lapse for latest information) would be too long. It is 2020. Electrons move at the speed of light,” said Gandhi. “Along with nurses, janitors, lab and respiratory technicians, all we are asking for is that we have the right equipment as we go into these environments.”

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