Yorkshire firm which provided chemical-resistant material during Gulf War offers up product to make 25,000 protective gowns for NHS

Industrial Textiles & Plastics Ltd, based in Easingwold, produces special chemical-resistant PPE fabrics, which are resistant to toxic chemicals and chemical warfare agents.

Their products were used in the Gulf War to make shelters resistant to potential chemical attacks.

But they have now set aside enough of the material to make 25,000 gowns - all they need is to find a business who can make the actual garments.

Richard Menage, Managing Director, said their material is usually sold to specialist manufacturers of chemical resistant garments and gas tight suits which are used in industry, hazmat teams and defence markets.

And he admitted the material was likely more resistant than the NHS needed.

But he had offered the material to Government at cost price if it was possible to find someone to turn it into something useful to tackle the coronavirus.

Mr Menage, who first contacted the Government two weeks ago and heard back from them yesterday, said: “Our experience in the past is whenever there's been an outbreak of one thing or another, such as Ebola and other sort of not pandemics, but epidemics, what you find is that the more disposable suits go off the shelves very quickly. They run out of stock.

“And then what do they do? They say, well, we need something, so we'll go for the chemical suits, and it’s really to do with supply.”

He said the coronavirus had “caught everyone by surprise” and “it's not something you could really plan for”.

He said: “And the NHS is in difficulty because they're getting to the situation where they're desperate for new stocks of PPE. The shelves are being emptied and replenishing them is difficult because the UK manufacturing base has been depleted and a lot of it has moved east, to India and China.

“So you call on what else is immediately available, now our stuff is way, way over-spec, but nevertheless it can get them out of a hole.

“The medical sector is not something that we sell to, so we don't know who these makers are, so we've said to the Cabinet Office, ‘look, we've got to learn this stuff, this stock, by way of contribution, we can offer it at cost, without a profit element, and just just put us in touch with whoever's making it for you in the UK.”

He added that it might be the NHS could use the material for something besides gowns, but he was keen to help in whatever was possible.

“They might have something up their sleeve which our material is ideal for,” Mr Menage said.

“There's a whole range of uses you could think of, isolation units made of this type of material, there's all manner of stuff you could use it for.”

He added: “It's great that we can all do our part.”

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering, who was previously MP for Thirsk and Malton, had been assisting Mr Menage in offering his products to Government.

She said: “If any good at all is to come out of this epidemic it could be that a local firm with years of experience in supplying these materials could come to the aid of the NHS and patients, doctors, nurses and carers, and come up with a supply of the much-needed material for PPE.”