When the EU followed Taiwan’s lead and banned export of all personal protective equipment last week, it sent Canadian hospitals, governments and businesses scrambling to fill the void.

Hospitals in Toronto and Southwestern Ontario had relied on one 3M plant in the UK for masks and the EU ban (which still applies to the UK despite Brexit) shut down that source, according to executives at two southern Ontario hospitals.

“The U.K. plant under the European Union, they will not give North America the masks,” said Premier Doug Ford during his daily press conference Tuesday. “So, we’re doing everything we can to make sure we have a supply on hand.” 3M did not provide a comment by Wednesday afternoon.

While breweries and distilleries were able to rapidly convert their equipment to produce hand sanitizer, it’s not going to be as easy to make face shields, respirators and ventilators, said Guillaume Laverdure, president of Medicom, an infection control product manufacturer based in Montreal.

“You have some products which are not specifically difficult to make, but the capacity is limited,” said Laverdure, who has been approached by several companies looking to tap into Medicom’s production expertise.

Garment industry insiders also point to medical grade certification as a potentially-insurmountable barrier to quickly converting plants to manufacture specialized items like masks and respirators.

The overwhelming majority of the world’s supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) is made in China and southeast Asia, and because the coronavirus pandemic started there, the supply was redirected to local needs months ago.

Taiwan imposed an export ban on all PPE in January and China’s government has been purchasing virtually all local production of PPE before it can be exported, severely hampering Canada’s access to N95 masks and other PPE. When the EU implemented a ban on all PPE exports on March 15, Canada went from concerned to desperate.

The federal government has started distributing PPE from the national emergency strategic stockpile to the provinces and territories, Eric Morrissette, a spokesperson for the Public Health Agency of Canada, told the Star.

Calls went out earlier this week from both the federal and provincial governments to local businesses for any lingering supplies of PPE that can be commandeered for medical use.

Universities, tattoo parlours, dentists offices, hairdressers and non-emergency medical facilities including fertility and plastic surgery clinics, all have inventories of PPE that could be pressed into use.

While both calls received massive responses, they may not be enough to face the expected surge in coronavirus cases in the months ahead.

Currently, hospitals are not reporting any shortages. But stockpiles are only expected to last another two weeks and resupply is uncertain, said Mitze Mourinho, president of the Michael Garron Foundation.

This leaves Canada no other option than producing new supplies, quickly, and in unconventional ways.

Last week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced federal aid for Canadian manufacturers of PPE to “massively scale-up” production. There would also be federal support for companies looking to retool their production lines to make medical supplies.

Getting a production line rolling “takes months and months of capacity investment,” Medicom’s Laverdure said.

Auto parts manufacturers, including Ontario-based Martinrae International, said last week that they will work with governments to retool factories for PPE production, though they cited the difficulty of needing technical guidance.

Beyond know-how, there is also the question of securing enough raw materials — the plastic and paper products as well as the specialized impermeable fabrics necessary to make masks and gowns.

“Without the material itself, so you could add 50 factories to make mass (amounts of PPE) in Canada tomorrow, and they won’t be able to run,” said Laverdure.

Bob Kirke, executive director of Canadian Apparel Federation, said the real issue preventing Canadian manufacturing from producing PPE is certification, which cannot be quickly achieved in non-certified plants.

“There are very big challenges to converting factories from making t-shirts to making certified medical garments,” Kirke said. “There are certifications for a reason: You don’t want blood or other liquids to go through the fabric.”

While in the face of a looming crisis the U.S. FDA has relaxed standards so that non-compliant masks can be used, no similar change has been made in Canada, said Kirke.

“We know we can’t do a 100-per-cent compliant mask, but could we make one that is adequate for some purposes,” like giving to patients in waiting rooms, said Kirke.

Relaxed standards would allow hospitals to not worry about the legal implication of using non-conforming supplies.

“Is it time for Health Canada to relax some of the requirements to allow for a greater supply?” asked Kirke.

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This week, several North American auto manufacturers announced they would start producing PPE to meet the unprecedented demand.

On Monday, Fiat Chrysler put out a statement saying it would begin manufacturing one million protective face masks per month and donating them to police, paramedics, firefighters and hospital workers.

Asked where the masks were going to be produced, company spokesperson Kevin Frazier told the Star the first plant to be converted is in China.

While the company is evaluating other plants, Frazier said he would not speculate on any difficulties getting the masks out of China to the North American market.

Ford Motor Company announced Tuesday that it would convert local plants in Michigan to produce respirators and face shields in partnership with 3M.

The company said it could produce 75,000 face shields this week, before scaling up to 100,000 a week by April.

Ford would also work with General Electric to increase production of ventilators and use in-house 3D printing technology to make respirator masks.

“We’re talking about producing hundreds of thousands of these ventilators in the future,” Ford CEO Jim Hackett said in an interview with CBS. “The problem is that the lines that have been in place produce hundreds or thousands. We’re talking about needing hundreds of thousands.”

It will take time to reach this level of production volume, Hackett said.

“We’re talking about early June where we don’t think it is a problem, but between now and June, it is about ramping up.”

Luxury Parka maker Canada Goose announced Wednesday that it would start making scrubs and patient gowns at its facilities in Toronto and Winnipeg next week.

The initial run will be 10,000 units, with the potential to expand production to other facilities if needed, the company said in a statement. The gowns will be donated to local hospitals.

While it remains to be seen if the initiative from individual businesses will meet the expected surge of infections, the COVID-19 crisis has exposed a long-term weakness in Canada’s preparedness.

“The main issue is how do we make sure that every single country on the long term has a local supply source that they can rely on,” said Medicom’s Laverdure, who noted his company was founded in 1988 to meet the shortage of latex gloves amid the AIDS epidemic.

“We understand manufacturing locally may not be the cheapest option. There is always a cheaper option somewhere (else). But there is a price to pay to have guaranteed local supply,” he said.

“It’s not all about lean inventory and low cost,” he said. “Yes, it’s more expensive than buying from China. But it serves a purpose. I hope everybody would remember that.”