Governments from different parts of the world continue to increase their efforts to provide ventilators for critically ill COVID-19 patients. According to experts, Mexico needs to have more or less 20,000 ventilators but currently, the country only has 3,000 of those machines.


Mexico Addresses Lack of Ventilators 

The government announced the approval of the production of ventilators by the National Council for Science and Technology, also called CONACYT for Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología.

According to President López Obrador's statement, a French aerospace company that is based in Querétaro will be producing Conacyt's device. It Is capable of manufacturing 500 devices every week.

The first batch of the production is set to be delivered on the first to the second week of May. According to health officials, it is expected that during this period, the country will expect its peak number of COVID-19 cases.

The approval for the ventilators came from the Federal Commission for Protection against Sanitary Risk, more commonly known as Cofepris.

On the other hand, five other lower-cost ventilator manufacturing projects are pending for the approval of Cofepris. Volkswagen, Team México, and three universities in Mexico are planning to create the device.

Twenty-five multi-disciplinary engineers from Sonora man the latter. They are planning to use 3D printers to create the ventilators, similar to a project made in Spain.


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In a recent press conference, the Mexican president stated that the second prototype of a ventilator created by Conacyt would be the last phase of testing, and it can be allowed for reproduction by the third week of May.

However, despite the increasing demand for ventilators, it should be noted that having them does not ensure the survival of all people who have severe cases of COVID-19.

According to new research conducted by the Journal of American Medical Association, 88 percent of COVID-19 patients that the study tracked had lost their battle with the deadly illness.


Ventilators, an Essential Tool in Today's Crisis

In simpler words, ventilators are used to support a patient's breathing process when their lungs start to fail. It allows the patient to give more time to battle the infection and survive, says an article.

According to the World Health Organization WHO, 80 percent of the individuals who catch COVID-19 can recover from the illness without needing treatment in the hospital. However, one in six people gets severely ill from COVID-19.

In severe COVID-19 cases, the SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, causes damage to the patient's lungs. This causes the oxygen levels of the body to fall and make it difficult for the person to breathe.

A ventilator works by pushing air into the patient's lungs, thereby moderating oxygen levels in the lungs and helping the patient breathe.

Additionally, the ventilator has a humidifier, which helps add heat and moisture to the supply of air to allow it to match the temperature of the body of the patient.