Zimbabwe is now producing a wide swathe of personal protective equipment as more local firms are responding to the Government’s call to manufacture locally and with better quality.
PPEs that being produced locally include surgical face masks, disposable non-woven polypropylene coveralls, medical aprons, shoe covers, disposable blue line coveralls (Tyvek), shower caps, KN95 face masks, latex gloves, disposable bed sheets and lab coats.
Vice President and Minister of Health and Child Care Dr Constantino Chiwenga said those in the health sector should buy locally manufactured PPEs when these were available to boost production. “Let us develop that capability to develop and build our country. Technology is not a preserve of anyone. If we do not have that technology, we acquire it,” he said recently.
One of the local production companies, Marcandice, is manufacturing between 80 000 to 100 000 different PPE products daily from production up to the packaging stage.
Marcandice chief executive Ms Martha Chikata said her clientele included both Government institutions such as hospitals and customers in the private sector, pharmacies and mines.
“We are employing 30 people permanently then we have 50 tailors on contract basis,” she said.
Ms Chikata sampled one of their products, a surgical mask, which she said had better quality than the imported ones.
“As you can see if you pour water on our product it does not penetrate like what the imported ones do,” she said. “This shows that we are not only substituting the products, but we are doing so with better ones.”
A worker at the factory, Mr Polane Chomuda, described part of their work.
“I operate a shoe cover making machine,” she said. “It produces 200 pieces per minute. The technology is quite user friendly as I operate it alone. It feeds the material, shapes it, straightens it and cuts at the end into a final product.” Another employee, Mr Nigel Mushonga, who operates a face-mask making machine, shared his experience.
“A face mask is manufactured using three raw materials,” he said. “The process is similar to that of the shoe cover. One face mask has close to zero chances of infection penetration due to the material we use. They also respond to local conditions unlike the imported ones.”
Kadoma Textiles and local universities such as Harare Institute of Technology are among local firms manufacturing the PPEs.
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