Covid-19 tagged interest

Connecticut BioTech and TicketNetwork announced today the launch of an initiative designed to get people back to live music, theater, and sporting events – safely and confidently. The initiative will see the ticket resale marketplace and PPE distributor team up to distribute high-quality FDA approved N95 respirator face masks to venues across the country at $0.50 each.

Mask distribution will be prioritized and scheduled for different venues based on capacity, scheduled events, annualized attendance history, and other factors.

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“We need to open venues up as quickly and as safely as possible,” TicketNetwork CEO Don Vaccaro says. “Getting N95 respirators to both venue staff and patrons coming through the turnstiles will help them accomplish that goal. As an ancillary benefit, the release of this number of masks into the marketplace will move the supply curve to the right, decreasing the equilibrium price, which will force some of the commercial speculators of masks to release the 100s of millions of respirators they have in storage to the American people and help save even more lives.”

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Providing a respirator face mask, of known quality, will provide greater staff and patron safety than current guidelines, which allow for patrons to self-select face masks that may be of far less efficacy than the N95 standard.

“N95 respirators are selling on the world’s largest marketplaces and medical wholesale suppliers at prices up to and even above $6.00 each, with marketplaces charging billions of dollars of fees on those sales driven by the pandemic demand,” says Vaccaro, who launched Connecticut BioTech in 2020 to provide solutions to the PPE supply crunch caused by such practices. “This is all impacting people who are trying to protect themselves from a deadly virus, and disproportionately impacts people of limited means. That stops today!”

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With the Biden administration showing an early focus on mask-wearing as a key element to slowing the spread of COVID-19 as vaccination efforts continue across the country, this initiative is aimed at taking the guesswork out of safely reopening for venues, many of which are counting on a strong return in 2021 after seeing their doors shut since March of last year.

Venues should apply online today