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Most U.K.-Made Ventilators Won’t Arrive Ahead of Virus Peak

Most U.K.-Made Ventilators Won’t Arrive in Time for Virus Peak

(Bloomberg) -- When Britain’s government issued an urgent call to industry for thousands of hospital ventilators, more than 5,000 companies offered to help. Coronavirus infections are expected to peak next week and there’s little to show for their effort.

Significant deliveries from the firms are still weeks away, and the embattled National Health Service has resorted to foreign imports and loans from the armed forces and the private sector to double its ventilator count to around 10,000. While the national lockdown appears to be slowing the spread of Covid-19, the NHS may need as many as 8,000 more of the devices, according to Health Secretary Matt Hancock.​

The government is under intense pressure to solve Britain’s shortage of the machines that are vital for treating critically ill patients. It already spurned an offer to join a European Union program for procuring ventilators, initially stating it was no longer a member of the bloc and could source them locally, before backtracking and saying it had missed the email inviting participation. EU leaders are struggling to coordinate a response to the virus; last night they were unable to agree on a 500 billion-euro ($543 billion) stimulus package.

​It’s not that U.K. Plc can’t do the job: The machines are seen as relatively straightforward to make and much of industry has been sitting on its hands since the economy tanked. The problem is that vacuum cleaner maker Dyson Ltd., engineering contractor Babcock International Group Plc and other newcomers to the business need their designs to be fully tested and approved.

It can take months for the U.K. Medicines & Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to sign off on sensitive medical machinery. The process can be expedited, but still takes valuable time to ensure patients’ safety.

“It’s a race against the clock,” said Derek Hill, a professor specializing in medical devices at University College London. The regulator is “literally working all hours making this happen fast.”

For now, the supply of ventilators from British manufacturers is tiny. The NHS expects to receive 30 locally-made machines this week, compared to 300 sourced from China over the weekend.

Department of Health and Social Care officials say they are confident there will be enough ventilators to meet demand, given the steps being taken to increase the number available, and as long as people continue to stay at home to reduce the spread of the virus.

Pistons, Turbochargers

In the short run, the greatest hope lies with consortium Ventilator Challenge UK, which includes Meggitt Plc, Airbus SE, GKN Ltd, McLaren Automotive Ltd and Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc. They plan to churn out 1,500 ventilators a week using designs from Penlon Ltd. and Smiths Group Plc, two medical device makers that can currently only make about 50 to 60 of the machines per week on their own. The group already has an approved ventilator from Smiths. But it’s still closing in on final approval for the other, and its factories and supply chains are in need of re-calibrating, so large deliveries are unlikely before the end of April.

​A breathing aid developed by engineers from the Mercedes Formula One team and University College London has been approved for use. It’s being manufactured at a rate of as many as 1,000 a day using machines that would normally produce racing car pistons and turbochargers. It’s not as sophisticated as a ventilator, but it can help reduce the need for those devices.

Companies such as Babcock -- which has a government contract to make 10,000 of its Zephyr Plus ventilators -- face a longer wait for approval. They may end up being useful in a potential second or third wave of infection.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who is in hospital with the disease, set a challenge last month to source 30,000 ventilators.

The government now says fewer will be needed because lockdown measures have slowed the virus’s spread. The NHS has 2,000 extra ventilators on standby, with 1,500 more due to arrive by the end of the week, Hancock said on Sunday.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.