Lagos state governor, Babajide Sanwo Olu has on Thursday 30th July 2020 commissioned Nigeria’s first indigenous medically certified face mask factory in Lagos.
The factory owned by TransGreen Nigeria Limited is located at Odofin Park Estate, Ijesha B/Stop, Apapa-Oshodi Expressway, Amuwo Odofin, Lagos state. It will be producing many kinds of Personal Protective Equipments (PPEs) starting with face masks. The first product is high quality World Health Organisation (WHO) standard face masks branded as O-Care. It currently produces 240,000 face masks daily and ready to expand as demand increases.
The CEO of TransGreen Nigeria Limited, Pastor Cyprian Orakpo, while addressing guests at the commissioning ceremony said that as long as the world is yet to find a preventative vaccine or curative drugs to arrest the lethal menace of COVID-19, face masks and other medical devices like gloves, PPE, ventilators have suddenly become national security products.
Pastor Cyprain noted that as many nations banned their exports to other nations as they didn’t have the capacity to meet their local needs. This resulted in acute scarcity in many countries including Nigeria and made the prices of these highly needed products to skyrocket.
He said that O-Care face masks initiative was achieved against all odds posed by Covid-19 pandemic and within 3 months, the factory was set up and started production.
“This time around, Transgreen Nigeria Limited, maker of O-Care Face Mask, has risen up to the occasion to fill this void and contribute her quota as the first indigenous company to produce local medical face mask. This factory is primed to produce up to 240,000 medical face masks daily,” Pastor Cyprain said.
“O-Care 3-ply medical face mask offers protection against dust, pollen, bacteria and all known viruses with breathable comfort and low respiratory resistance. This product is durable and manufactured to WHO standards,”
“As an organisation, we believe that by making affordable medical face mask available and accessible to all, we are helping Nigerians and indeed Africans to live and work freely, learn, and play, create and work, doing the wonderful things that keep humanity moving forward during these trying times, ” Pastor Cyprain added.
Reacting to this development, the Lagos State governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, pledged the state government’s support towards the company’s success by making the first order of 250,000 medical face masks.
“If COVID-19 is going to be with us for a while then we need to think of how to domesticate some of the preventive measures of which O-Care Medical Face Mask from TransGreen Nigeria Limited is taking a bold step as the first indigenous company to produce medical face mask and we are going to support them,” he said.
“We are going to support this company because this is a strategic production line that is important to us in our existence as human beings; we are going to be supporting you in area of procurement by making the first order of 250,000 medical face masks on behalf of people of Lagos State.”
To further grace the occasion, the Vice President of Nigeria Prof. Yemi Osinbajo joined the epic commissioning event via virtual medium.
In his address, VP Osinbajo said that Covid-19 pandemic is by far the worst public health and socio economic crisis of our generation because it hit the entire world at the same time.
In his words, the Vice president said: “Most countries that we could look to for medical supplies could not even supply their own local needs. To control the spread of the virus we clearly needed good quality face masks. The sheer commitment and focus of the TransGreen team is remarkable and must be commended.”
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