Hospitals in regions experiencing a surge of
coronavirus patients are struggling to maintain supplies of antibiotics, antivirals and sedatives required for patients on ventilators, and other drugs produced in countries where the pandemic has halted or curbed manufacturing.
Although overlooked by a public focused on shortages of ventilators and personal protective equipment, hospitals are increasingly concerned about future shortages of lifesaving drugs as authorities in India and other countries producing the drugs try to guarantee supplies for their own people.
New York, the state with the highest number of infections and deaths in the United States, has experienced spikes in demand for fentanyl and other sedatives needed by patients experiencing respiratory failure who are placed on ventilators for up to two weeks. The Food and Drug Administration placed another sedative called midazolam on an official drug shortage list last month.
“Everyone has been discussing the requirements for more vents, but no one is discussing the needs for patients when they are on the vents, the sedatives, anesthetics and paralytic agents,'' said Onisis Stefas, vice president and chief pharmacy officer at Northwell Health, a 23-hospital system in New York.
Other drug shortages have emerged as unintended consequences of the coronavirus. When doctors hoping to prevent the coronavirus from getting airborne inside their facilities avoided nebulizers for patients with respiratory trouble, they inadvertently created shortages of everyday albuterol asthma inhalers in hospitals and retail pharmacies.
