WORCESTER — The impacts from Hurricane Helene that left a swath of destruction in the South have created local concerns about the availability of intravenous fluids, a vital ingredient for hospitals and health care systems.
“It’s a challenging issue,” said Kimi Kobayashi, chief quality officer at UMass Memorial Medical Center.
Baxter International’s manufacturing plant near Ashville, North Carolina, the largest maker of IV fluids and peritoneal dialysis solutions in the U.S., temporarily shut down after it was flooded by Helene. The result is a widespread disruption in supplies…