Hull safety giant Arco is helping the 海角视频 get back to work after securing a staggering 140 million face masks.
The personal protective equipment specialist has already welcomed the first order of 19 million units, prioritising the NHS and key customers.
Face coverings - to be required by all in hospitals and on public transport from Monday, June 15- are part of government guidelines when social distancing is not possible to drive down the risk of infection transmission.
A series of 20 trucks brought the masks to the new £25 million National Distribution Centre in Hull, and now 100 pallets a day and 5,000 parcels are being dispatched by a round-the-clock team.
It is one of the largest orders ever placed, with Arco staff in China checking capability, quality and standards, and the specialist Hull lab ensuring compliance.
David Evison, Arco’s managing director, told how it would be a continuous supply over the next three to four months.
He said: “We are facing an important time for the country, these are significant orders, remarkable, some of the biggest orders that we have placed. We are in a very fortunate position, having just invested in the new National Distribution Centre which has given us the capability to deal with them..
“It is not very often you would place such orders, or have the requirement, and rising to the challenge shows our strength.
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“Many are committed to support the NHS, a big chunk are surgical masks.”
The supply chain starts in the Far East, with staff there having conversations with factories to ensure they can produce, with quality and ethical standards also checked.
“It is important we make sure of the right quality, not just the right order, but it is critical to support the 海角视频, we have got to do it in the right way,” Mr Evison said, with an acute awareness of sub-standard products hitting the market.
Tests are completed in a special laboratory in Hull.
“Mainly we deal with the NHS, or other big industries. We don’t generally deal with the public, but we do have retail shops and the website where people can order on,” he said.
“Our focus is on the NHS trusts, care workers and front-line responders, we have been doing a lot of work with them to ensure the right products.
“We identified right at the beginning we had a responsibility to our key customers, food manufacturers, people supporting utilities, and we’ve worked really hard to protect supply. “There was a massive shortage of PPE so our role was to protect existing big customers as well as the NHS.”
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Arco has also developed a set of expert advice sheets to ensure a safe return to the workplace.
The ‘toolkit’ is aligned with Government advice and covers topics such as managing risk, cleaning the workplace, working safely during coronavirus and personal protective equipment – what to wear and how to use it.