Winston-Salem - Activewear giant HanesBrands is adding to its facemask production pledge with a promise to manufacture 20 million medical gowns to be distributed by the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency to hospitals and healthcare facilities in need during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The company has already produced and delivered more than 60 million cloth face coverings for the US government and is ahead of schedule to deliver more than 320 million of the washable, 3-ply all-cotton face coverings.
The new, long-sleeve medical gowns are made from fabric designed to be splash resistant and can be washed and reused. They will be distributed by FEMA to hospitals nationwide and temporary treatment facilities.
Hanes is producing these reusable face coverings and gowns in accordance with efforts by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response to supplement supplies of nonsurgical personal protection for use during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Hanes is also rapidly securing additional manufacturing capacity to meet surging demand for face masks and other garments from consumers, retailers and business-to-business customers, including employers preparing to reopen business operations.
“Our employees have gone to extraordinary lengths to meet the challenge of very quickly pivoting our production to large quantities of face coverings and medical gowns,” said Michael E. Faircloth, group president, global operations, American casualwear and e-commerce. “Making basic protective supplies is consistent with our capabilities to make everyday apparel, but these are new product lines and required a significant amount of work and planning. We are proud that these efforts are benefiting our company, our communities and our government.”
The FDA issued an emergency use authorization for face masks, including cloth face coverings, in response to concerns about insufficient supply and availability for use by members of the general public and healthcare personnel for source control. It should be noted that facemasks are not authorized to be personal protective equipment. They are not a substitute for filtering face piece respirators or for surgical face masks.
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