One of the biggest problems became apparent during the earliest days of the COVID-19 pandemic: Availability of PPE. With an unprecedented demand for facemasks, gloves, sanitizer, and other items, store shelves were quickly picked clean, and it created an opening for countless scams claiming to have PPE available. Healthcare providers and emergency services also often found themselves with a very limited supply, as was made apparent by many state authorities throughout the past several months.
The problem is a lack of control and accountability in the supply chain. It quickly became a question of simply ordering from wherever you could get the items, even though you may not have know where the masks or sanitizer came from or whether they actually met quality standards. When you add the mismanagement of an already depleted supply, access to PPE quickly because a major issue and those who need it may not have access, increasing the risk of spreading the virus across population groups.
“If the last few months have taught us anything, it is that the existing chain of protocol and systems are not well-equipped to meet the needs of an emergency.”
Raj Chowdhury, CEO, HashCash Consultants.
HashCash Consultants, recently launched an initiative to help securely manage the massive amounts of COVID-19 healthcare data that’s being generated by healthcare providers to enable better data access, research, and response strategies.
Now, HashCash is looking to leverage its HC Net blockchain to create a solution to help PPE providers optimize their operations, from manufacturing to distribution.
“While we try to rise above the present situation, it is a priority to create new protocols and infrastructures that will allow us to mitigate future adversities. To that effect, HashCash has teamed up with the enterprise to build and deploy advanced and futuristic architectures to streamline the supply of essential commodities, in this case, PPE.”
Raj Chowdhury
HashCash’s venture with several PPE manufacturers focuses on integrating the supply chain infrastructure with blockchain to optimize the entire operation under a single network. The goal is to drive increased coordination between manufacturers, suppliers, distributors, and healthcare organizations and others who need to buy PPE in bulk quantities. HC Net will provide the foundation for the distributed and transparent supply chain protocol.
As with other blockchain projects, all participants will have access to the data to track PPE in real time, from manufacture to delivery. The system will provide complete transparency and traceability to the process and making it easier to ensure a constant supply of critical PPE where it’s needed, including ensuring an additional emergency supply is available should the need arise.
Will Blockchain solve COVID-19 on its own? No. But, it can provide a level of security and transparency that can help those who are actually working on solutions do their work better.
