On a battered workbench using makeshift materials, Farouk Sharaf, an electrical engineer in Gaza , puts the finishing touches to his home-made ventilator.

The mechanical device, made of a self-inflating ambu bag valve mask and metal piston, looks disarmingly rudimentary – but it works.

Once it is perfected and tested by health ministry officials, the 36-year-old specialist plans to build at least 100 machines to save lives amid an outbreak of the deadly coronavirus in the besieged Palestinian enclave.