US mask makers say they are being clobbered by cheaper competition from China

“As long as foreign masks are available, [hospitals and other US buyers are] going to keep buying them,” said Mike Bowen, the vice president of Texas-based mask manufacturer Prestige Ameritech. Bowen has warned for years that US dependence on cheaper foreign masks poses a national security issue.

The solution, he said, is to stop all imports. “Any plan that government has that allows foreign masks in the US will fail to secure the supply chain,” he said. He believes the US government should use any tool at its disposal, including tariffs and subsidies, to achieve this goal. But he’s not hopeful the government will risk that kind of upheaval with Covid–19 still spreading. “I think the pandemic will end without securing these supply chains,” he said.

Significant progress?

In addition to the smaller producers that came into the market, several major manufacturers also ramped up production significantly last year. Honeywell increased its N95 production capacity 50-fold to a billion per year. 3M tripled production of N95s and other respirators in 2020 compared to 2019. And, at the same time, according to Bown’s research, the amount the US spent on PPE imports from China more than tripled.

Soon after taking office earlier this year, President Joe Biden signed two executive orders calling for federal agencies to review the US’s PPE supply chain and identify potential shortfalls in domestic manufacturing capacity. “We shouldn’t have to rely on a foreign country, especially one that doesn’t share our interests or our values, in order to protect and provide for our people during a national emergency,” he told reporters in February.

The White House tells CNN significant progress has been made on reducing imports and prioritizing domestic production of PPE. According to Tim Manning, the administration’s national Covid-19 supply coordinator, in the US “[the] current estimate is that manufacturing capacity matches what we believe is unconstrained demand [in the US].” A report from the government accountability office in July backs this up, showing that by March this year, estimated production capacity for N95s in the US had exceeded estimated domestic demand.

In addition to the billions of dollars already committed to shoring up domestic manufacturing in the administration’s American Rescue Plan, he said more money is coming and the administration is “rethinking” the way it creates its supplier contracts to focus on US-made products. It’s also having conversations with group purchasers for hospitals, and state and local government officials about buying US-made PPE, he said.

Planning for the next pandemic

The key question for the US government, however, is how much domestic production it needs to support in times of low demand “to make it easier to scale up production when you do have a pandemic,” said Bown.

Even though the White House says there is enough manufacturing capacity in the US to meet demand now, there’s also a risk it will go away as the pandemic dies down. Honeywell says it has already closed manual production efforts for N95s at two facilities, though the company says it has maintained automated lines at other locations.

Wolin said his company needs government support so it can survive the lean times and be around when it matters. When the CDC relaxed its mask guidance in May, demand fell off a cliff. Protective Health Gear went from having 150 employees to 15. Now, as demand increases due to the spread of the Delta variant, they’ve ramped back up to 65 (hiring is proving to be another major challenge).

Wolin said he has been in talks with the government about buying its N95s for government agencies and the strategic national stockpile, but so far no deal has been made.

“We’re not asking for handouts. We know that you need these particular supplies and we’re just asking that you purchase what we have,” he said.