Over 500 visors provided to West Middlesex University Hospital

Fundraising Appeal to protect front line medical staff

OWGRA (Osterley and Wyke Green Residents' Association) and local police have delivered over 500 visors to West Middlesex Hospital this week, as well as 400 masks donated by a local mosque.

OWGRA and Neighbourhood Watch have launched a fundraising appeal to supply these, directly working with a small group of volunteers who are running a number of 3D printers making them for workers in Surrey and Kent.

After around £1,000 for two printers, the cost of materials for each visor is about £1.

Lawrence Hawcroft, Vice-Chair of OWGRA explains the process:

"We have had to be creative on materials as lots of suppliers have run out, but we now have enough to last for a few weeks. This has meant we have bulk-purchased some materials.

"We also have to be very careful in making and distributing them to ensure the absolute minimum number of people are in contact with them when making and distributing them, and that we are rigorous in hand-washing, etc. This has impacted the design we can use (simple with minimal "afterwork" needed), where we locate the printers (all together) and the distribution of them (via a single channel).

"We are now ramping up production as quickly as possible. The printers can be temperamental, but the team running them now have them running smoothly. To date we have only been running the printers when they are attended for safety reasons (risk of fire). We are about to move to 24 * 7 working (once we have the necessary fire alarms and thermal cut-outs added to the printers to allow it to be safe to run them unattended)".

Please donate to help protect our local NHS front-line staff via the crowdfunding page .

All money raised is funding materials and costs associated with printing. At the end of this project, any funds left will be donated to a charity that is associated with the aftermath of Covid-19 and requires support.

PPE equipment required by front-line staff includes a number of items, and one of the key ones is Visors, which consist of a framework for the medical staff to then apply a clear plastic Acetane sheet over the front. These do not need to be sterile as they are not used in a sterile environment; they are purely to try and stop expelled droplets being projected on to the person who is wearing the Visor. These visors have been effectively used all around the world and were designed by 3DVerkstan.

April 16, 2020