8,000 face shields printed for NHS

Covid-19 Faceshields gifted from UKAEA and Cisco

A face shield project inspired by a UKAEA engineer has finished after 8,000 components were shipped to NHS and social care organisations around Berkshire.

In April, Emil Jonasson, a Control Systems Software Engineer at RACE, helped to put in place a community effort, partnering with local businesses to provide PPE for NHS surgeries and hospital trusts, .

Emil – who is a member of rLAB (Reading’s Hackspace/Makerspace) – found an open-source design for a 3D printed headband (a component needed to make face shields for the NHS) created by Josef Prusa. He decided to post his idea to support the urgent need for PPE, within the NHS, onto the Hackspace discussion group.

This led to Emil working with other rLab members: Alex Gibson, who owns 3D printing company Edumaker, and Matthew Richards, a Product Engineering Manager at Cisco. A print production line was set up at Cisco’s Reading offices with more than 100 volunteers involved. Emil was tasked with sourcing the additional materials needed to create the components for the shields.

Emil said: “I am amazed by the hard work and dedication of Alex, Matthew, Kathryn Baddeley (Head of Corporate Social Responsibility at Cisco) and the many other volunteers from Cisco who gave up so much of their time to keep the production line going 24/7 – even throughout weekends and bank holidays.

“They have done an amazing job and provided so much help to our health services.

“I also need to thank the staff at RACE (Ethan, Steve, Diane) for being extremely supportive throughout, tipping me off about potential suppliers and being very understanding towards me for the intense weeks when I was distracted by this.

“It’s also been great to see the UKAEA internal initiative to produce the same type of face shields on site.”

PICTURE: Staff from Oakley Health Medical Centre express thanks for the face shield project

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