The US government does have such a stockpile. > The Department of Health and Human Services said last week that the stockpile has about 12 million N95 respirat

The US government does have such a stockpile. > The Department of Health and Human Services said last week that the stockpile has about 12 million N95 respirators and 30 million surgical masks —a scant 1 percent of the estimated 3.5 billion masks the nation would need in a severe pandemic. Another 5 million N95 masks in the stockpile are expired. https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/face-masks-in-national-stockpile-have-not-been-substantially-replenished-since-2009/2020/03/10/57e57316-60c9-11ea-8baf-519cedb6ccd9_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/face-masks-in-... The article goes into a lot more detail, including what the stockpile includes, funding, and information about state stockpiles.