Hospital gowns, purchased for £122m, never used

Millions of medical gowns bought for the NHS at the end of the first lockdown for a cost of £122 million have never been used.

The gowns were ordered by the government from PPE Medpro, which had set up just a month earlier, and no other companies were asked to bid for the contract. PPE Medpro says it had met the agreed terms.

At the time that the supplier was set up as a company in May, hospitals across the country were reporting shortages of personal protective equipment - clothing and accessories to protect medics from the virus. Just six weeks after it was incorporated, PPE Medpro signed a contract with the Department of Health and Social Care for £122 million to supply sterile surgical gowns to the NHS in England.

The contract was not opened to competition due to the exceptional urgency of the coronavirus pandemic. PPE Medpro say they delivered 100 per cent of the contract to the terms specified, although there are question marks over whether the gowns met the British Standard for the sterilisation of medical devices, or a ‘technical equivalent’.

It was revealed in August that 50 million face masks bought by the UK government from a different company earlier in the year would not be used in the NHS because of safety concerns.