The Washington Hospital Association announced that hundreds of thousands of fake N95 masks ended up in dozens of Washington hospitals. The counterfeit masks are well constructed and appear in every way to look like 3M manufactured masks. They even include the 3M logo, display of lot numbers, certifications, and warnings like a real mask.

Area hospitals are already sending out memos to their staff on the situation and pulling the impacted masks out of circulation. Hospital workers, including at critical medical facilities treating COVID, unknowingly started using the masks in late December. There is no information on if any hospital workers were sickened by using the fake masks.

N95 masks are produced through a specialized process that creates an electrostatic charge in the filter material. Most viruses are too small to be stopped by conventional paper or cloth masks, but the amount exhaled or inhaled is reduced. The electrostatic charge in an N95 and KN95 mask attracts the particles as they attempt to pass through the weave and capture them. Without the electrostatic charge, the cover provides no more protection than other woven masks.

3M developed this process, and their masks were readily available before the spread of COVID for medical and industrial use. High demand by the medical community has put a lot of strain on the supply chain, increasing costs by 200%, and during most of 2020, state and hospital officials were on their own to secure their supplies.