During a recent TRSA Webinar, Kevin Schwalb, TRSA’s vice president of government relations, outlined a multi-year advocacy effort to increase the use of reusable healthcare textiles, particularly reusable personal protective equipment (PPE), in healthcare facilities across North America.

Schwalb described this initiative as one of the association’s highest lobbying priorities, driven largely by lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic. Schwalb noted that the pandemic-era shortages of 2020-’23 put both patients and healthcare professionals at risk. “One of the things that we recognize is that healthcare facilities do not carry nearly enough reusable healthcare textiles in their models ...