April 20, 2020 | BY David Vergun , DOD News
The most serious impacts to the Defense Department from
COVID-19-related industrial closures domestically are in the aviation supply
chain, shipbuilding and small space launch, the undersecretary of defense for
acquisition and sustainment said.
Speaking at a Pentagon news conference today, Ellen M. Lord
said that internationally, several pockets of industrial base closures are
affecting DOD, particularly in Mexico.
Lord said she's working with the State Department and with
the Mexican government to try to get those companies reopened. ''These
companies are especially important for our U.S. airframe production,'' she
added.
The Defense Contract Management Agency is carefully tracking
the state of the military's industrial base for the large prime companies, Lord
said, and the Defense Logistics Agency is monitoring smaller vendors.
Out of 10,509 prime companies, 106 are closed, Lord said,
noting that 68 other companies had closed, but have since reopened. Out of
11,413 vendor-based companies, she said, 427 are closed, with 147 that had
closed and are now reopened.
Lord also provided an update of current COVID-19 actions
taken by DOD.
The department is working closely with the Department of
Health and Human Services and the Federal Emergency Management Agency,
contracting for about $500 million in lifesaving supplies and equipment to
service members and federal agencies, she said.
This support includes providing 60 decontamination systems that
can sterilize up to 80,000 N95 masks per day. They are on order, she said, with
some already delivered.
DLA is working closely with the services to better
understand COVID-19 requirements, such as quantities of personal protective
equipment for various locations, Lord said. DLA has provided 1.8 million N95
masks, 3.2 million nonmedical surgical masks, 54.8 million exam gloves, 8,000
ventilators and 275,000 isolation and surgical gowns to the services and
several federal agencies, she said.
Additionally, Lord said, 3 million face coverings have been
ordered for DOD personnel, with deliveries starting this week. She said she
expects 135,000 delivered by the end of this month and 580,000 by the end of
next month.
Last week U.S. Transportation Command was able to use the
Defense Threat Reduction Agency's Transport Isolation System to move three
COVID-19-positive cases from Afghanistan to Germany. These systems were
developed during the 2014 Ebola outbreak but were never used until now, she
said.
At-risk contractor employees in Afghanistan will leave that
nation due to insufficient medical capability there, Lord said, noting that the
projected number who redeploy will likely be less than 1,000.