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Sharon Foster (CT)'s avatar

I hope their constituents ask them why they voted against both measures, but I doubt they'll get the chance. I do like the way the Dems are doing these single-issue bills, so it's clear just who's for and who's against. Babies Lives Matter.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

If someone can tell me why these people voted no, I’d appreciate it. For 3 of the 9, their websites had no mention of a reason. I gave up looking.

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Sharon Foster (CT)'s avatar

I assume it's the usual GQP opposition to anything the administration asks for.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

Right. That makes sense.

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Patricia's avatar

Yes we areback to McConnell not letting anything get through Congress etc just like Obamas last term. They are evil and need to go!

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Carol M Robinson's avatar

Wow. No mention of the bill or why they voted no?!? No accountability to the people especially to those who voted for them. Oh right. After they take the oath of office they are not accountable— to hell with the oath the voters and theor babies.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

I couldn't find an explanation but I gave up trying after checking three of the representatives' websites.

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Sharon Foster (CT)'s avatar

I just saw a clip where Boebert says she voted against funding for baby formula because the money goes to the FDA to acquire it, but says she is willing to try and find alternative solutions. Such as? "Give the money to me and my BFFs and we'll buy it for you"?

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Susan Campbell's avatar

What alternative did she offer? And why NOT the FDA?

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Mary Ann Dimand's avatar

Pro-fetus, anti-woman, anti-fetus. But even more alarmingly to me, anti-substance. No wonder they embraced Trump: for them, everything is a game move, not a decision with tangible results that work out in a real world of human lives.

And that perspective is spreading in the way, with news media often acting as vectors of infection, I'm afraid.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

Maybe it's the anti-substance that is so attractive. "Hey! I don't have to think! I just vote for THIS one."

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Mary Ann Dimand's avatar

Yes, I think the right has gone next-level on its appeal to a combination of laziness and sneering.

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Ava's avatar

It appears there is more to this shortage. Trump's USMCA trade agreement restricted importing formula from Canada. The US imported pretty much no formula during 2021. However, the US exported formula to Canada. Of course, it's more complicated than that, but it does speak to the irony of the GOP blaming Biden (aside from their vote against providing relief to actual living babies).

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Susan Campbell's avatar

Thank you for adding context to this. I had read that and forgot to include it. It takes a village to write this Substack.

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Stan H's avatar

Yeah, it wouldn't be crazy to have a government run sterile compounding facility to handle just these kinds of emergencies.

The crisis that's happening now with Abbott actually happens frequently with commodity products that have to be made under extremely strict manufacturing practices. The margins on these products are low and the manufacturing is very difficult, so companies ultimately exit when better opportunities arise, leaving only two or three manufacturers to supply all the demand. When one of them experiences a compromise in sterility or has a contaminated ingredient and gets shut down, the competitors do not have the capacity to ramp up production to fill the gap. Other companies may have the manufacturing capability and capacity, but the opportunity to switch over and start making something like baby formula isn't very attractive. The reason is that when Abbott comes back on line it will take the business back.

In the health care world this happens all the time with generic pharmaceuticals.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

Thank you for this. So it isn’t unusual in this field to have so few producers?

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Stan H's avatar

Not even a little bit.

In health care we have a bunch of smaller compounding facilities that are nimble enough to switch over when one of these events occurs. But they are still only able to satisfy a fraction of the demand. And a lot of them are mom and pops that are not very well regulated.

Sometime when you get a chance check out this story I did at my old company about compounding gone bad.

https://www.aorn.org/outpatient-surgery/articles/outpatient-surgery-magazine/2016/july/compounding-disaster

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Stan H's avatar

P.S. I didn't do the awkward first paragraph. The company that bought my company must have put it there.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

This is good information to have. And thank you. And I am a fan of awkward grafs as I write them a lot, myself.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

This is an incredible story. Thank you for sharing it.

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Stan H's avatar

thanks. Here's something even more disturbing than the story. Several of the key players got off scot free. And Greg Conigliaro got a sentence of "no more than five years." A spectacular instance of how our regulatory system AND our justice system fails us.

PS Sorry it was so hard to read. The company that bought my company redid the website and screwed everything up--the sidebars and the blurbs happen right in the middle of the story with no warning. They disgust me.

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Susan Campbell's avatar

That's a bummer, but honestly? As I was reading it, I was thinking "Stan's a writer."

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Patricia's avatar

Meanwhile that certain station continues the propaganda and mis leads millions of Americans by saying they didn't have enough inspectors to get it open. They ignore the other facts involved and fail to mention the money that Abbott made and they could have avoided this altogether. Enough I am angry and grow anger by the day. This is a war on women!

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Susan Campbell's avatar

Indeed. Swords up.

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May 20, 2022
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Susan Campbell's avatar

A-the-hell-men.

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