MA Joins 7-State Consortium To Purchase PPE At Lower Costs

Massachusetts is joining six other states that will work together for the purchasing of personal protection equipment, tests and ventilators during the coronavirus crisis. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Sunday his state was joining Massachusetts, Connecticut, Delaware, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island in the consortium.

Cuomo said the partnership will help reduce the price of PPE, which are things like gloves and medical-grade masks. The states will work together and keep from bidding against one another.

"This will increase our market power and help prevent price-gouging," Cuomo tweeted Sunday. "States are stronger when we work together."

Gov. Charlie Baker has joined Cuomo and other governors in very critical of how states have had to go about acquiring PPE. A bidding process has pitted states against one another and the federal government in trying to procure necessary equipment, sometimes from the same supplier.

"I'm telling you, we're killing ourselves trying to make it happen," Baker said in March.

Baker said last week the state has delivered more than 7 million pieces of PPE and is aggressively working to acquire more.