Medical workers share concerns about masks delivered by Patriots plane
It was a rare moment of celebration in a season of misery: The New England Patriots team plane touching down at Logan Airport April 2 with a massive cargo of scarce respirator masks for front-line health care workers who were trying to save lives.
But like so much else in this global pandemic, the ensuing reality has proven to be more complex.
As well-intended and carefully executed as the covert mission to China had been, at least some and possibly many of the roughly one-million protective masks on the team plane were not the time-tested, industry-standard N95 masks that medical workers wear when treating coronavirus patients. Rather, they were a Chinese version known as a KN95 mask that some hospitals in Boston and beyond have so far declined to use and remain reluctant about today.
The state did not respond to questions about what was actually on the plane or how it has been distributed, though one local hospital administrator said he heard that about half the shipment had been sent to area nursing homes.
Read more: https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/04/12/metro/medical-workers-share-concerns-about-masks-delivered-by-patriots-plane/