Driven by a shortage of face masks in Tunisia, a fashion designer decides to take a break from the fashion world to produce face masks. Khouloud Geusmi has turned her small atelier into a workshop. There, tailors are producing reusable face masks.
She only started one week ago and at first self-financed the project. Then other associations pitched in to fund the small workshop of 30 tailors.
Geusmi is using her degree in biology to produce face masks that are up to health standards. With her degree, she has no problems distributing them to hospitals and pharmacies.
The tailors produce face masks using a durable and breathable non-woven fabric. Geusmi says ” We use the TNT [non-woven] fabric. There are two layers so that it is more effective. The material itself is breathable since it has small openings and an internal layer functioning as a protective shield”. She adds that theses masks are better than those sold in pharmacies. Those sold in pharmacies she says “are used once then discarded, while we can can wash these masks and reuse them”.
The masks are dispatched daily to hospitals and pharmacies. Already, 8,000 masks have been distributed. The workshop produces between 1,000 to 1,500 masks every day. She aims to produce more than 10,000 masks in upcoming weeks.
Tunisia suffers from limited health infrastructure. There are 423 reported cases of COVID-19 in Tunisia and there are have been 12 deaths due to the virus (April 2).
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