Yeah, that's grotesque. Everyone who works on the front lines of providing care to COVID patients is a first responder, and whether they or their employers pay, is irrelevant.
It is the moral imperative of leadership to do what it takes to resolve the situation now, and figure out the details later.
Not to mention, I've always said we need more expensive health insurance in America.
> If you just start confiscating them then anyone who did something we very much would like them to have done right now -- stockpiled a lot of such equipment to profit in just such an emergency, thereby causing such a stockpile to actually exist -- would see what you've done and choose not to do it anymore. And then next time the shortage is worse.
That's not true, the government can learn from this catastrophe and not disband the entire pandemic preparedness department a few months before a pandemic. It could therefore create a national stockpile of gear first responders might need in a pandemic, and fill it at contracted prices. As they have done with oil. And helium. And raisins.