Veterans Affairs orders $300,000 worth of body bags
The Department of Veterans Affairs ordered nearly $300,000 worth of body bags this month, according to a contracting document reviewed by POLITICO. The department ordered the body bags from a major contractor called ISO Group because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to the site. The contract was reached on April 15.
The order came as the VA has seen a growing number of deaths due to the pandemic. More than 8,500 patients of the VA have been diagnosed with Covid-19 and nearly 500 have died, according to data on the department’s website Thursday morning. The number of confirmed cases has grown by 3,000 since the contract was inked on April 15.
The contract did not say how many body bags the department was buying, and it is unclear whether the VA bought them because it expects a spike in patient deaths or because it plans to redistribute them to others who might need them. VA spokespersons did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
The Federal Emergency Management Administration recently paid $5.1 million for 100,000 body bags, as first reported by The Wall Street Journal — for a price of about $51 per bag. If the VA paid the same rate, it would have purchased nearly 6,000 bags — a number 12 times larger than the number of VA patients who have died from the disease.
But some retailers sell body bags for lower prices; BodyBagStore.com sells them for as little as $16.80, but limits on how many bags a customer can buy. And on Amazon, one vendor sells body bags for less than $15 each.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/30/va-orders-300-000-worth-of-body-bags-227445
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