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posted by Fnord666 on Sunday June 28 2020, @03:02AM   Printer-friendly
from the but-I-got-a-great-deal! dept.

FEMA Ordered $10.2 Million in COVID-19 Testing Kits It's Now Warning States Not to Use:

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has warned states not to use COVID-19 testing supplies it bought under a $10.2 million contract after a ProPublica investigation last week showed the vendor was providing contaminated and unusable mini soda bottles.

[...] ProPublica reported on June 18 that Fillakit was using plastic preforms, which are expanded with heat and pressure to become 2-liter soda bottles, to fulfill FEMA's contract for testing supplies to be used by states. The bottles were shoveled into the warehouse, then filled with saline in what workers described as unsanitary conditions. Some of the states receiving the lab equipment told ProPublica that even if Fillakit's tubes weren't contaminated, they were simply too big to be used in lab machinery.

[...] The FEMA spokeswoman said the agency continues to provide "critically needed testing supplies in a timely manner to our state and local partners in response to the coronavirus."

FEMA signed its first deal with Fillakit on May 7, just six days after the company was formed by an ex-telemarketer repeatedly accused of fraudulent practices over the past two decades. Fillakit has supplied a total of more than 3 million tubes, which FEMA then approved and sent to all 50 states.

Wexler has previously declined to comment. A ProPublica reporter visited the facility this month and confirmed that workers were using snow shovels to gather up tubes and filling them, all in the open air.


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  • (Score: 2) by jasassin on Sunday June 28 2020, @03:32AM (9 children)

    by jasassin (3566) <jasassin@gmail.com> on Sunday June 28 2020, @03:32AM (#1013552) Homepage Journal

    I can't believe FEMA is so stupid. It seems to me you'd have to intentionally screw pound's of pooches to pull this level of boneheadedness off.

    Fermaldahyde trailers.

    Zica coffins.

    2 litre bottle Corona test-kits.

    Jeez! What next? Lotto scratchers for the next hurricane victims?

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  • (Score: 2) by sjames on Sunday June 28 2020, @04:02AM (1 child)

    by sjames (2882) on Sunday June 28 2020, @04:02AM (#1013559) Journal

    So you're saying the director of FEMA couldn't (or shouldn't) be elected as dog catcher?

    • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @05:48AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @05:48AM (#1013576)

      Where's Brownie when you need him - come back all is forgiven forgotten for God's sake is this all the people we've got?!

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @06:30AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @06:30AM (#1013588)

    I can't believe FEMA is so stupid.

    1. who is asking you to give guidance to/about FEMA?
    2. actually, it was a very smart move. For Paul Wexler. Probably a good insider friend with enough authority in contractual matters; both of them may not finish rich enough to retire, but even some extra money helps nowadays.

    2 litre bottle Corona test-kits.

    No, only tubes from which 2l bottles can be blown. They look like this [google.com]

  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Sulla on Sunday June 28 2020, @06:45AM (4 children)

    by Sulla (5173) on Sunday June 28 2020, @06:45AM (#1013593) Journal

    In a period of urgency/emergency I think we can cut some slack. To me this seems like the solyndra situation. There is a sense of urgency to fix a problem (climate change, pandemic) and a wide net is thrown out to procure resources and look for new ideas that can benefit the whole. You know there will be failures, but you hope the successes outshine those failures.

    https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-testing [ourworldindata.org]
    How many tests are performed each day?
    Those results look pretty good with the US leading the pack, although it doesn't look as logarithmic as I would like.

    showed the vendor

    Vendor should be fucked though. Were they doing the classic move of seeing the system isn't doing checks and sending hammers over for 50k? Or did they try and have a manufacturing error?

    --
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    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @08:33AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @08:33AM (#1013606)

      In a period of urgency/emergency I think we can cut some slack.

      Don't auto-mutilate, Sulla, don't cut your dick off even if is slack.

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by HiThere on Sunday June 28 2020, @02:53PM (2 children)

      by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Sunday June 28 2020, @02:53PM (#1013678) Journal

      To me is sounds more like corruption. The incompetence required to do this by accident is such that speaking normally would be impossible.

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      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @05:30PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @05:30PM (#1013736)

        When a company that didn't exist a week before it is awarded a $11M contract, then yes, it is corruption. They should be happy that they are at least delivering something, which is more than some of these fraudulent companies do.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2020, @12:41AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 29 2020, @12:41AM (#1013912)

          Delivering something unusable isn't an improvement because people then have to waste time disposing of the garbage.

  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @10:11AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 28 2020, @10:11AM (#1013618)

    Google/whatever 'benign neglect', 'society of the spectacle'.

    Consider the fact that classic 'benign neglect' was fine when you completely controlled the press and media, alas, nowadays you've got to be seen to be doing something as there's always some pesky cunt with a Youtube 'channel', twitter account and a Wordpress site watching these days with their eyes set on having their very own five minutes in the sun, so you now have new 'benign neglect', do the bare minimum to maintain the status quo and/or arrange for anything you're seen to be doing to be a placebo to appease the great unwashed (cf. The 'vaccine', coming real soon now...remind me again, how's the search for the SARS and MERS vaccines been getting along? )..and, of course, even if that gets found out, the song and dance surrounding all this still feeds into the glory that is the spectacle...bread and circuses.

    I should have bought shares in popcorn manufacturers...