APRIL 12TH WEEKLY ANNOUNCEMENT & RESOURCES THREAD!
This group made 2.5X more medical supplies this week than the week before, and we are up to over 840,000 medical supply items fabricated and distributed worldwide! AMAZING WORK! We are now starting to see local chapters that are providing all of the PPE their hospitals need, full stop.
We have a new Open Source Medical Supply Guide (v1.2.1) that gives you a frank and accurate review of COVID19 and its treatment, and catalogs the designs sourced by Open Source Medical Supplies.
It includes a ton of new reuseable/sterilizable face shield designs, a ton of face mask designs that range from no-sew personal protection to N95 protectors for hospitals, a bunch of new gown designs that are desperately needed by hospitals all over the globe, new categories for mask helpers/ear protectors that let healthcare workers wear masks for long periods of time, a number of tools like bias tape makers that help sewers be more productive, and includes a lot more information about sterilization and disinfection of masks and respirators.
We now have over 150 local chapters of Open Source Medical Supplies producing PPE and more all over the world! If you need supplies for your hospital, business, or care facility, reach out to these groups and they may be able to help you.
We have a new Local Response Guide (v1.1) if you want to learn more about how you can help your community, or start your own chapter of Open Source Medical Supplies. It includes a lot of new guidance on fundraising, purchasing, reporting, and lots of on the ground learning from existing groups in the hardest-hit areas around the world.
YOUR CONTINUING JOBS
We continue to ask all the members of this group to:
1. Learn about COVID-19, its treatment, and the need for locally-made open source supplies via our Medical Supplies Guide
2. Make things that your communities and hospitals actively need and are willing to accept.
3. If you have the ability, design medical supply items that are needed, using fabrication processes that are widely available.
4. Organize yourselves effectively in local regions so that you can respond to community needs without overwhelming people with offers of help.