Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection officials seized more than 100,000 counterfeit 3M surgical masks in El Paso, Texas, on their way to a hospital on the East Coast.
The N95 masks, worth roughly $600,000, were intercepted at a bonded warehouse in El Paso by Homeland Security Investigations and were taken to CBP’s Ysleta Cargo Facility, where officials determined that the masks were counterfeits after working with the 3M Company and the National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center, according to a press release.
“The seizure of these counterfeit surgical masks not only ensures the health and safety of our frontline health care workers by preventing them from receiving inferior personal protective equipment, it also protects the integrity of the American economy,” ICE special agent Erik Breitzke said in a statement. “We will continue to aggressively investigate, arrest and prosecute criminal counterfeiters who show a total disregard for human life and take advantage of a relentless world pandemic for economic gain.”
Since the coronavirus pandemic began, hospitals nationwide have consistently reported “severe shortages in personal protective equipment,” including N95 surgical masks, according to Preventive Medicine. Those shortages, caused in part by disruptions in the global supply chain and a “dysfunctional budgeting model” in hospitals that incentivizes cutting costs instead of maintaining sufficient PPE inventories, have prompted a surge in counterfeit PPE.
“Millions of counterfeit products are appearing on the market,” according to Nature, “largely on sale from online vendors and linked to resourceful and adaptive criminal gangs.”
The counterfeit mask interception was part of ICE’s Operation Stolen Promise, established in April “to protect consumers from the increasing and evolving threat posed by the pandemic.” The operation is a coordinated effort with a number of federal agencies and private partners, including 3M.
“HSI and CBP will continue to collaborate to prevent unauthorized and counterfeit products from getting to U.S. consumers to protect the health and safety of the American public and the American economy,” said Ysleta Port Director Arnoldo Gomez. “This large seizure of counterfeit surgical masks, destined for front-line medical workers, demonstrates the great collaborative effort between CBP and HSI. Counterfeit surgical masks pose a great risk to our medical community and any individual who may use them.”
