Gridiron Gear

[Theo Pontbriand]

Aussieshave been falling in love with American Football since WWII. Today, you find it played all over the country, watch it live on One or Foxtel, and can join one of the 70 or so leagues yourself! Heck, our national team even went to the IFAF World Cup!

If you've ever had an interest in the game, or are thinking of converting over from Australian football, now's the time to join in on the action! All you need is some new gear, a ball, and plenty of friends, and you've got yourself a gridiron game!

Like the Americans in the NFL, you'll need a gridiron helmet, facemask, shoulder pads, and cleats to get started. At Sports Unlimited, we've got all the best gear from some of the oldest, most trusted football brands in the world. Our prices, selection, and variety are second to none, and we'll even ship right to Australia, so there's no worries mate!

With expiration dates passing and few requests to tap into the stockpile, Ohio auctioned off 393,000 gowns for just $2,451 and ended up throwing away another 7.2 million, along with expired masks, gloves and other materials. The now expiring supplies had cost about $29 million in federal money.

A similar reckoning is happening around the country. Items are aging, and as a deadline to allocate federal COVID-19 cash approaches next year, states must decide how much to invest in maintaining warehouses and supply stockpiles.

States emphasize that they distributed far more gear than they discarded and have gone to lengths to donate the leftovers. Washington state sent hundreds of thousands of supplies to the Marshall Islands last year. Pennsylvania says it offered PPE to 10,000 cities, heath facilities and more throughout the pandemic. Both states still ended up throwing out loads of expired items.

But others say the vagaries of the pandemic and the PPE supply left no choice but to acquire the items, and now to throw them out, however reluctantly. Expiration dates are set to ensure the protection works as intended, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency has set the fair market value of expired supplies at zero dollars.

Pennsylvania officials are aiming for a 15-day stockpile after frank conversations about what they can afford not only to keep, but to keep replacing. Tens of thousands of cases of PPE already have expired and been slated for disposal.

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