• Coronavirus, makers help to create 3D valves for the Chiari hospital

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21 March 2020Products created with 3D printing, conversion of textile production to manufacture protective masks and overalls, digital platforms to connect production capacity and needs.

This is now needed to combat the coronavirus epidemic and, therefore, innovative solutions are needed to increase the offer of the European medical and protective device industry.

The Videoconferencing Compet
EU industry ministers (Compet Council) spoke about this topic in a conference, in the context of a discussion on the impact of the epidemic on the internal market and its consequences on the sector.

The Single Market and Digitalization Commissioner Thierry Breton attended the virtual meeting: "We have a collective responsibility to mobilize all the tools at our disposal to respond to the epidemic. We must make sure that our healthcare professionals and patients have access to masks, others protective equipment and medical equipment such as lung ventilators ", and added:" We must act urgently, in solidarity and boldness ".

Don't stop production
Ministers, according to a Commission note, agreed on the importance of a well-functioning single market and on the need for EU coordination, and discussed innovative solutions to increase production in the medical device and production sector digital, how to avoid supply chain disruptions and how to deal with the economic impact of the epidemic on businesses.

Center for companies that convert the business
In the meantime, in Italy, in the Modena area, the heart of the Emilia-Romagna biomedical district, an excellence in the biomedical sector is in the running to become a national reference point for the tests on surgical masks that companies want to produce by converting their activity for the emergency, in derogation from current legislation, as required by the 'Cura Italia' decree.

A feasibility tutorial
In particular, Tecnopolo Mirandola, an Emilian research center, makes itself available to companies for the qualitative verification of the masks. Barbara Bulgarelli, director of the center, says: “In these first few days we are receiving various requests from all over Italy: we note that those who are not in the biomedical sector need to have basic information useful for verifying the feasibility or otherwise of the prototype. For this reason we will make a tutorial, which we will put on our Youtube channel, to make the preconditions more evident in order to develop the project ".