No sooner did India report its first Coronavirus case on Thursday, the scrutiny over the outbreak within Indian media circles has been quite pronounced. The medical and healthcare beats of several news websites have been pressed into reporting on the outbreak. Some reports suggested that manufacturers of N-95 masks in Madurai had stepped up production, in the light of increasing demand. The only problem: there are no manufacturers of N-95 masks in Madurai.
Almost every news website that reported the story quoted Abilash Andrew, the managing director of Madurai-based AM Mediwear, on the increasing demand of N-95 masks from the temple town. CNBC-TV18 got in touch with Abilash to find out if his company was indeed producing these masks. He denied it.
There are a handful of surgical companies who claim to be dealers of N-95 masks, namely Sushmitha Surgicals, Arambans Exporters and Delhi-based Elanor Surgicals. However, none of these companies have a manufacturing footprint in Madurai. Other names like Royal Surgicals and Sophy Surgicals do not manufacture N-95 masks in the city. There are no other known manufacturers of N-95 masks registered in Madurai.
"The N-95 mask is the most suitable to prevent contracting Coronavirus owing to the presence of four or five layers, which prevent the entry of microbes," said Abilash, speaking to CNBC-TV18 over the phone, "Our company makes surgical masks, which we supply to a number of corporate clients. But we do not produce the N-95 variant."
What Abilash did concede, however, was given the spike in demand for N-95 masks, several exporters and users are settling for three-layered masks as an interim measure in the hope that the supply of N-95 masks matches the massive requirement in due course. However, AM Mediwear has not been in a position to service even this requirement, on account of clogged capacities.
"I have been getting 200 phone calls since the outbreak from companies in China, Malaysia and Spain requesting for three-layered surgical masks," said Abilash, "However, I have had to turn all these requests down since my existing capacity of 25 lakh surgical masks per month is just about enough to service existing demand. I'm adding excess capacity to bring my production up to 35 lakh masks, but even that is to satiate demand from existing clients. I have had to turn everyone else down."
AM Mediwear says that it doesn’t plan to foray into manufacturing N-95 masks, nor add capacity in order to cater to the sudden spike in masks. "I believe the demand is momentary," said Abilash, "Once things stabilise and the outbreak is contained, this demand will gradually drop, and any excess capacity will serve no purpose."
Most reports doing the rounds have also claimed that manufacturers are almost doubling prices of masks from Rs 20 to Rs 38 per mask, in the face of increasing demand, without attributing the same to any given manufacturer. AM Mediwear has denied hiking prices for its surgical masks.
