Saline bag supplies running dangerously low across the country

[230gr]

How does this make sense? This is not a high tech medicine here!

Saline bag supplies running dangerously low across the country

They’re used in hospitals all over the country, but a national saline bag shortage is hitting home.
The FDA said saline bags had been in short supply since 2014, but supplies plummeted even further after this year's devastating hurricane season.
Doctors and nurses at the Partner Oncology Clinic said supplies are now dangerously low and they could run out of saline bags in two days.
They’ve been calling and emailing companies all over the world trying to get more saline with no luck.
People who need it most are worried.
It’s tough enough 68-year-old Gail Miller is fighting her second round of metastatic breast cancer. Now, she’s facing another battle in her treatment: she can’t get her hydration fluids.
Doctors said the national saline bag shortage became worse after Hurricane Maria slammed the production factory in Puerto Rico.
“It’s scary and frustrating,” said Miller. “I’m trying to take one step forward, and not two steps back.”
Nurses at her oncology clinic, Partner Oncology, said for the past two weeks they haven't been able to do hydration treatments and they’ve had to send patients to bigger hospitals.
Now, they’re saving the few bags they have left to dilute powerful chemo drugs for patients.
“People are going to die if we don’t get saline,” said Emily Lanum with Partner Oncology. “At this point, we have just enough for chemo and it’s not going to last us very long and we’re trying to decide who (we) can treat and who we can’t and that’s not a choice that has to be made.”
Nurses said they found a company in Canada selling the saline at nearly five times the price.
“It’s just not been good,” said Miller. “I feel bad for myself, I feel bad for everyone. Because there are people who are much sicker than I am and they really rely on that.”
The FDA said it’s responding to the shortage by temporarily allowing saline imports from Australia and Ireland.


http://komonews.com/news/local/people-are-going-to-die-national-saline-shortage-reaches-dangerous-levels

[TWP]

It's a case of reliance on a single source.  Production was done in Puerto Rico and the factory is down, post hurricane.

You would think that there were would be a manufacturer in the contiguous states but apparently not...

So now they are importing the bags from outside the US.

I'm guessing that there will be no "falling on swords" because of this, but I'd hate to be someone who is dependent on having having saline drips to stay alive.

[TWP]

As a follow-up on this story, I'm reading more than one "report" and thread post which implies that the supply of SALINE SOLUTION is in short supply.   I DO NOT BELIEVE THIS IS THE CASE.

It is the BAGS, which are used to deliver the solution, which are sourced from Puerto Rico,  which are not being made while that area recovers from the hurricane.

Be careful what you read and even more careful what you believe.

[230gr]

Looks like the problem is only with the small, IV bags of saline used primarily to mix with other medications. Still sounds like a problem to me.   

Saline supply hamstrung by Puerto Rico disaster

he natural disaster in Puerto Rico knocked out the manufacturing capacity for small-volume presentations of sodium chloride and dextrose at one of two major suppliers, and that could send a ripple effect throughout the U.S. healthcare industry.
Baxter International is the biggest supplier of intravenous bags of dextrose and sodium chloride, also known as saline, that providers regularly give to patients to regulate heart rate and blood pressure during heart surgery, among other uses. Baxter said its Puerto Rico manufacturing facility, which produces smaller-volume bags of the IV fluids used primarily to mix with other medications, has lost "multiple production days" after Hurricane Maria tore through the island. The company said that it has resumed limited production in all of its facilities on Puerto Rico and that its larger-quantity saline products were not impacted.

Puerto Rico is home to dozens of drug and device manufacturing facilities, including cancer drugs, immunosuppressants used by transplant patients and devices for diabetic patients, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration commissioner, said in a statement on Sept. 25. In the face of a natural disaster of this proportion, it is an evolving landscape and so we will continue to stay on top of the situation," he said. "We are aware of several other instances where we may soon face critical shortages if we don't find a path for removal or ways to get production back up and running.

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20171004/NEWS/171009964