Status: 05/19/2022 02:27 am
The US has set up an airlift for baby milk that has become scarce in the country. The US government activated a Cold War law to boost production.
The US government sets up an airlift to import baby milk from abroad. The Department of Defense “will use its contracts with commercial cargo airlines, as it did in the early months of the Covid pandemic, to ship products from factories overseas,” the White House said.
The government wants to take action against the lack of baby milk in large parts of the country. The government also invoked a Cold War law to oblige manufacturers of ingredients used in baby milk production to prioritize supplying milk powder factories. This will “make it easier to increase production and speed up supply chains,” the White House said.
In recent months, there have been delivery problems with baby milk in some regions of the USA, which poses major problems for parents of young children. The supply chains were initially affected by a shortage of workers due to the corona pandemic. In February, an important US factory for Abbott baby milk had to be temporarily closed after irregularities were discovered.
Department of Defense should help
The Defense Production Act allows US Presidents to intervene in the private sector in the interests of national security. In the corona pandemic, the regulation was last used to oblige companies to increase the production of medical devices and protective masks.
In order to expedite the import of baby milk powder, Biden has now also instructed that Department of Defense airliners could be used to bring infant formula from abroad to the United States, it said. As at the beginning of the corona pandemic, the Pentagon will use its contracts with commercial air freight companies to transport products from foreign production sites. Bypassing the regular air freight routes saves a lot of time.
European manufacturers export more
The US government only announced on Monday that it would allow more imports of baby milk powder because of the bottlenecks. According to its own statements, the US drug agency FDA also agreed with Abbott on various precautions to reopen the affected factory. However, the company said it would take several weeks before production there could start again and baby milk formula could be delivered to retailers.
The leading European manufacturers Reckitt Benckiser and Nestle announced on Tuesday that they would export more baby food to the United States than usual.