Billions were spent on unusable or overpriced protective equipment, annual accounts show
Ministers spent almost £9bn on personal protective equipment that was either substandard, defective, past its use-by date or dramatically overpriced, according to figures released on Monday.
The Department of Health and Social Care paid £12bn while emergency-buying PPE for the UK in the year to 31 March 2021, its annual accounts show. Tonnes of items bought for £2.6bn were never usable by the NHS – this figure is now £2.7bn – and a further £670m worth of PPE was not usable at all in any healthcare setting.
