"It was a natural progression for us. In March we realised there was a serious problem with our medical capacity. We heard there were only around 3,500 ventilators in the country and at the time scientists predicted we would need around 40,000 for the predicted infection rate.
The fund will be giving the ventilators to the national department of health, which in turn will distribute the machines to hospitals around the country. "A ventilator usually costs between R30,000 to R50,000. We are able to produce 2,000 units with just short of R40m given to us by Solidarity [Fund]."Rosslyn, Pretoria, is home to the main CPAP assembly line. MCR Manufacturing had just extended their factory by another building when Covid hit.
"The process was labour-intensive. It took me two weeks to create the parts needed. In normal circumstances it would take around two years for a manufacturer to get the go-ahead from [] to begin production, but it's taken us six months and the approval process was stringent.""I never thought I'd be making ventilators but we just had the right machines to work with," he said.
He said at least 100 jobs per factory were saved, with 35 people directly involved in the CPAP production.Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the portfolio committee on trade and industry heard that SA was unlikely to experience a shortage of ventilators should the country experience a second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.