Yep, the shortage has gone on for years because it wasn’t a priority.
Most probably because politicians didn’t want to part with the money, they had too many pet projects of their own.
The weird thing is every year, upwards of 80,000 people die from the flu- likely from respiratory failures- why weren’t we concerned about shortage during those past flues? There were way more people in respiratory failure/distress then then there are right now (Though that could change when life gets ‘back to normal’ and folks come into contact with others again-)