Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, sourced 1,255 ventilators from Chinese manufacturers and donated them to healthcare facilities in the Los Angeles area to help medical professionals cope with the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
Musk wrote in a tweet on March 23rd:
China had an oversupply, so we bought 1255 FDA-approved ResMed, Philips & Medtronic ventilators on Friday night & air-shipped them to LA. If you want a free ventilator installed, please let us know!
The move was praised by California governor, Gavin Newsom, who stated during a news briefing that same day:
Elon Musk: how about this? I told you a few days ago he was likely to have 1,000 ventilators this week. They arrived in Los Angeles and Elon Musk is already working with the hospital association and others to get those ventilators out in real-time. It’s a heroic effort.
Last week Musk offered to make lifesaving ventilators if necessary after health experts warned that there weren’t enough for everybody who’s going to get sick with COVID-19 in the United States. However, to manufacture them will take time, so Musk decided to source already made ones for the time being.
Ford and GM are also repurposing their factories along with Tesla to make ventilators.
Bloomberg reported that there are six more California-based companies also offering up their factories to manufacture essential supplies like gowns, and 25 other companies are planning to start 3D printing masks.
Gov. Newsom announced that California is short 50,000 hospital beds to meet needs as the pandemic spreads and confirms the comment saying, “That’s not a typo.” He also noted that the healthcare workers who will staff those additional beds would need more supplies. The state is looking to procure 1 billion gloves and more than 500 million masks.
