Dyson has received an order from the UK government to produce 10,000 ventilators to support the National Health Service’s effort to heal coronavirus patients and will donate an additional 5,000 to help the fight against the global pandemic.
James Dyson, the company’s founder, confirmed the order in a letter to his staff on Wednesday.
“A ventilator supports a patient who is no longer able to maintain their own airways, but sadly there is currently a significant shortage, both in the UK and other countries around the world,” Dyson wrote, according to CNN.
Dyson said the company designed and built a ventilator called the “CoVent” after receiving an order from UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson ten days ago.
“This new device can be manufactured quickly, efficiently and at volume,” Dyson added, saying that the ventilator was specifically designed to meet the needs of coronavirus patients.
A spokesperson for the company, best known for its hand dryers and vacuum cleaners, said the ventilators would be ready by April.
Dyson also wrote in his letter he would donate 5,000 ventilators to the international effort against the global pandemic.
“The core challenge was how to design and deliver a new, sophisticated medical product in volume and in an extremely short space of time,” Dyson, whose net worth is $10 billion, added. “The race is now on to get it into production.”
Healthcare workers all over the world are having trouble obtaining enough critical supplies to fight the coronavirus, such as masks, ventilators, gloves, and other personal protective equipment (PPE).
But other companies have stepped in to help meet that need.
Companies like 3M and MyPillow announced that they are making masks for hospitals across the U.S., while other CEOs such as Elon Musk have focused on sending ventilators to California.
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