I think you're conflating the interests of manufacturers and consumers? It's clearly in the interest of the hospitals to diversify their supply chains, but it's not clear to me that manufacturers (or their investors) are at the point where prioritizing resiliency over efficiency (in the capitalist concept of efficiency) makes economic sense. The fact that capitalism necessitates a certain form of efficiency to remain competitive/expand, and that form of efficiency inherently involves eliminating the redundancy, unoptimized system components, and "waste" that provide resilience, is probably a bigger problem than you think. And the actual capitalists who own the company have diversified their investments and glorify risk, so having one manufacturer fail in a crisis isn't a problem for them—obviously as a class they actually profited from the pandemic. Having each of the companies they're invested in become less profitable/competitive in their daily practices because they're investing in climate resiliency would be a problem though. So it isn't just about corporate executives not having learned lessons, it's about them existing in a system where they'll get fired if they opt for resiliency.
And the people responsible for purchasing/supply chain at the hospital do exist under the same pressures to cut costs vs diversifying the supply chain, and hospital admin is about profit not ensuring the hospital can function in a crisis, so while I think it's probably easier to fix on that side, the problem of efficiency does cascade through the chain.
SUCH good points! Makes me all the more worried that the problem is too big to make resilient on a grand scale. Anything you're seeing that makes you optimistic?
I think you're conflating the interests of manufacturers and consumers? It's clearly in the interest of the hospitals to diversify their supply chains, but it's not clear to me that manufacturers (or their investors) are at the point where prioritizing resiliency over efficiency (in the capitalist concept of efficiency) makes economic sense. The fact that capitalism necessitates a certain form of efficiency to remain competitive/expand, and that form of efficiency inherently involves eliminating the redundancy, unoptimized system components, and "waste" that provide resilience, is probably a bigger problem than you think. And the actual capitalists who own the company have diversified their investments and glorify risk, so having one manufacturer fail in a crisis isn't a problem for them—obviously as a class they actually profited from the pandemic. Having each of the companies they're invested in become less profitable/competitive in their daily practices because they're investing in climate resiliency would be a problem though. So it isn't just about corporate executives not having learned lessons, it's about them existing in a system where they'll get fired if they opt for resiliency.
And the people responsible for purchasing/supply chain at the hospital do exist under the same pressures to cut costs vs diversifying the supply chain, and hospital admin is about profit not ensuring the hospital can function in a crisis, so while I think it's probably easier to fix on that side, the problem of efficiency does cascade through the chain.
SUCH good points! Makes me all the more worried that the problem is too big to make resilient on a grand scale. Anything you're seeing that makes you optimistic?