DOD taps small business to help transport Ebola patients

A couple months after the Pentagon set out to find a system that would help transport Ebola patients aboard its aircraft, a contractor delivered.

Production Products Manufacturing and Sales Co. Inc. of St. Louis, Missouri won, in November a $2.38 million contract to deliver in a hurry a transportation/isolation module system for the Boeing C-17 or Lockheed C-130 transport aircraft. According to the Pentagon's justification for awarding the contract in lieu of full and open competition, it will be used for the safe evacuation of Ebola-exposed or Ebola-infected personnel from affected areas.

As described by the Defense Department, the system isolates the patient, filters the air that moves through the compartment, and allows access to treat a patient with a communicable disease that is airborne, or, in the case of Ebola, fluid-borne.

Who is Production Products? A small, extremely niche business that has been around since 1978, developing high-tech products for the military. Our sister publication, St. Louis Business Journal, featured the company in a 2004 article.

The Pentagon did mull a few other options: a chemical/biological aircraft survivability barrier, two different patient isolation systems (one out of Israel), and a Danish-developed large hard-side shelter with room for 12 stretchers.

But Production Products' Aeromedical Biological Containment System — developed previously under an Army contract for patient transport — won out. According to the justification document, the system was tested for chemical and biological agent performance as well as air worthiness requirements, and was already used by Phoenix Air to evacuate the four Ebola patients that were moved to the U.S.

Jill R. Aitoro covers federal contracting.