Tariff Talk

This month’s editorial is more serious than my usual tongue-in-cheek style—though don’t worry, my sarcasm hasn’t gone on vacation, just scaled back to business casual. I tackled the topic of tariffs in healthcare and what that means for the people keeping hospitals stocked and functional. You can read the full piece on page 8. It’s not exactly a beach read, but it might validate your stress levels.

Healthcare supply chain professionals know better than most how delicate—and let’s be honest, occasionally absurd—the global medical supply ecosystem is. Every day, behind the scenes, you’re sourcing gloves, syringes, diagnostic kits, and enough pharmaceutical components to keep things running… all while juggling backorders, vendor ghosting, and demand curves that behave more like roller coasters. And then—just to keep things spicy—we add tariffs.

These tariffs, originally imposed as part of broader trade disputes, were perhaps meant to flex economic muscle. But in healthcare? They’re just deadweight. They don’t improve quality, they don’t incentivize innovation—they just hike up prices and inject uncertainty into already fragile procurement pipelines.

Tariffs have become the surprise twist no one asked for in your weekly sourcing strategy meeting. They force impossible decisions: absorb rising costs (and hope finance doesn’t notice), pass them on (and hope patients can afford it), or cut corners (and hope that’s not the headline next month).

Some still cling to the idea that tariffs will jumpstart domestic manufacturing. But let’s be real: building a U.S.-based medical supply chain isn’t a quick DIY project—it’s a multi-year, multi-billion-dollar marathon that requires regulatory approvals, skilled labor, and some magical thinking. Until then, we’re left patching together global supply routes with hope and a spreadsheet.

What the industry really needs is targeted investment, smarter supplier diversification, and policies that reflect actual operational realities, not broad, outdated trade tactics. Tariffs create friction in places where we need agility, responsiveness, and yes, a little grace.

We learned during the COVID-19 pandemic that constrained supply chains can be the difference between preparedness and chaos. Removing tariffs on critical medical imports won’t solve everything—but it would be a solid step toward sanity.

It’s time to give healthcare supply chains the policy support they deserve. Because this work is vital—and it shouldn’t be a casualty of economic posturing.