[SteveNuts]

Then why don't they have millions of masks stockpiled for an event like this?

[owenmarshall]

They do. But they aren’t stockpiled for you: they are stockpiled for medical professionals.

And the 30 million the US has stockpiled is short by a factor of ten: https://time.com/5785223/medical-masks-coronavirus-covid-19/

[allovernow]

In any case we need more than masks for this. Medical equipment like mechanical ventilators, intubators, and external oxygenation machines. Those will run out very quickly.