The Trump administration haphazardly gave away millions of masks, STAT review finds

(ALEX HOGAN/STAT)

Community centers, major corporations, and state, local, and tribal governments have received hundreds of millions of reusable cloth face masks paid for by the federal government as an effort to beat back the Covid-19 pandemic. But an exclusive STAT review of mask recipients raises questions about inequitable distribution. A 140-student charter school in Florida received 37,500 masks, for instance. A beekeeping company got 500 masks as an “emergency services” provider, and despite reports of Covid-19 cases in hundreds of facilities, few poultry producers received any masks. “If you can’t find a method to the madness a few months later, it may mean it’s all madness,” Juliette Kayyem, a former Obama administration-era homeland security official tells STAT. “Where did those masks actually go?” Read more here.