Federal officials have been doing their best to stop counterfeit N95 masks from making their way to hospitals around the country. While the Department of Homeland Security has managed to confiscate over 10 million fake masks since the start of the pandemic, millions of the counterfeit masks have made their way to frontline workers in hospitals. Officials have opened investigations in at least five states.
3M, the company that makes a majority of the N95 masks sold in the U.S., has filed dozens of lawsuits against companies accused of making knock-off versions of the masks.
Earlier in the week, Washington officials said that at least 1.9 million counterfeit masks were distributed to at least 40 hospitals throughout the state. Most of the hospitals said the masks were still in storage and had not been distributed to workers. Officials said that the masks looked like the real thing.
"It's not like we just ordered them sight unseen," said Beth Zborowski, spokesperson for the Washington State Hospital Association. "We had two major medical centers in Seattle ... look at the quality, straps, cut them open and decide 'this looks like it's the real deal' before they bought them."
Last month, the Cleveland Clinic learned that many of the masks it had been using since November were fake and were "not effective as respirators." In December, 3M sued Nationwide Source Inc. for selling more than 10,000 counterfeit masks to the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis for more than six times the price of legitimate N95 masks.
In New Jersey, hospital workers complained that some masks smelled funny and caused rashes on their faces. When a worker discovered a letter on 3M's website warning that the lot of masks the hospital was using may have been counterfeit, managers began throwing them away. Despite their best efforts to get rid of the fake masks, workers are still finding them in use.
Steve Francis, assistant director for global trade investigations with the Homeland Security Department, told Fox News that the fake masks are dangerous because they give workers and patients "a false sense of security."
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