As of Friday, 3,035 Israelis have been tested positive for the coronavirus, including 49 in serious condition. As the number of people infected keeps on growing, an alarming report found that there are only 1,437 available respirators in Israel, and it is unclear whether those will be enough to handle all the country’s expected critical patients.

As respirators have become essential to deal with the complications of the coronavirus, First Robotics League, Microsoft Israel Research and Development, Ichilov Medical Center, Magen David Adom (MDA) and Unit 108 of the Air Force, have come together to find an innovative solution to avoid future shortages in Israel, and around the world.The Israeli Air Force is leading and managing the project.

The idea is to create an “open source” respirator that can be mass produced in labs at low cost, without the need for factories. The solution could allow the mass production of hundreds of automatic respirators per day.



"This is a product that uses a manual respiration balloon and operates it smartly and automatically. The product is under "open source", so that all of its assembling instructions are open to the public, in Israel and worldwide," the developers explained in a statement.

The product is developed with the assistance of Microsoft Israel Research & Development's recently launched Garage Innovation Lab, that provides students with the equipment and materials they need. "We are moving forward with the relevant organizations, and hope there will be no need," said a participating student.

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