On Friday, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra hosted a roundtable with government officials, hospital and clinical leaders, distributors, and representatives from Becton, Dickinson and Company (BD) to discuss mitigation strategies and solutions to alleviate the shortage of blood culture media bottles.
Secretary Becerra began the call by highlighting the importance of acting now in order to avoid more acute shortages as we move into fall respiratory virus season.
During the call, representatives from BD described actions taken to increase and stabilize production output over the past several months, supplement demand with BD BACTEC in glass vials and support customers with extended shelf life where possible. BD stated that customers should see improved allocation soon with production levels back to meeting 100% of historic demand levels by end of September for the U.S. market and 125% of historical weekly demand by the end of 2024 to enable distributors and customers in the U.S. to rebuild inventory and safety stock.
Staff from FDA have been in contact with BD to work to resolve this disruption quickly and efficiently.
List of Administration participants:
- HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra
- Stephen Colvill, Senior Policy Advisor for Medical Supply Chains, White House Domestic Policy Council
- Bertha Alisia Guerrero, Director, Office of Intergovernmental and External Affairs
- Laina Bush, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Science and Data Policy, Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation
- Hilary Marston, MD, MPH, Chief Medical Officer, U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA)
- Dora Hughes, MD, MPH, Acting Chief Medical Officer and Acting Director, Center for Clinical Standards and Quality, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)
List of Stakeholder Participants:
- American Clinical Laboratory Association
- American Hospital Association
- American Society for Microbiology
- Becton Dickinson
- Berry Global
- Cardinal Health
- Children’s Hospital Association
- Federation of American Hospitals
- Health Industry Distributors Association
- Infectious Diseases Society of America
- Medline
- Owens & Minor
