Hospitals across the country including those in Central Illinois are feeling the crunch due to an IV Fluid shortage in the U.S. in the wake of Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton.
Baxter International, the leading supplier of IV fluids to hospitals, said its facility in Marion, North Carolina, remains closed for the foreseeable future due to flooding from the hurricane. While the company has resumed shipments, restarting production likely won’t come until sometime at the first of 2025.
B. Braun, located in Daytona, Florida, who supplies another major portion of IV Fluids to the country, had sent their workers home on Wednesday in preparation for landfall of Hurricane Milton. The spokesperson speaking to the New York Times said they planned to go back to work Friday after the hurricane had moved on. Baxter and B. Braun supply about 85% of the nation’s IV Fluids. Similar issues hit the country in 2017 after a Baxter plant in Puerto Rico was shuttered after Hurricane Maria.
U.S. officials approved airlifts of IV fluids from overseas manufacturing plants on Wednesday to ease shortages caused by Hurricane Helene that have forced hospitals to begin postponing surgeries as a way to ration supplies for the most fragile patients.
Memorial Health has so far remained quiet about any of the exact issues they may be feeling due to the shortage. In a statement requested on Thursday by WLDS News, officials with Memorial Health say: “We are receiving a lower-than-usual supply of IV fluids. We have put plans in place to conserve our supply, while ensuring that patients whose conditions require IV fluids will continue to receive them. This is a rapidly changing situation which we are monitoring closely.”
Baxter is said to have cut down shipments by 40-60% to hospitals over the last few weeks in anticipation of the storms making landfall. ABC News reports that other manufacturers of IV fluids say they’re ramping up production to help cover the shortage.