On April 10, 2020, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) published a temporary final rule to restrict the US exports of personal protective equipment (PPE) in order to preserve certain scarce medical resources for the domestic battle against the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The rule is effective beginning April 7, 2020, and unless otherwise modified or rescinded, it will stay in effect for 120 days, until August 10, 2020.

Pursuant to this rule, exports from the US of certain listed categories of PPE, including filtering facepiece respirators, surgical masks, exam gloves and surgical gloves, are prohibited without the explicit approval of FEMA.

FEMA issued this temporary rule under the authority of the Defense Production Act (DPA) as part of its response to the COVID-19 pandemic.