COVID-19: Ordnance Factory Board comes up with isolation tents

The Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) on Tuesday said it has come up with a two-bedded tent having necessary medical facilities, that can be set up in any place.

It said the isolation tents could be a cost-effective way to increase isolation and quarantine facilities when the country is scrambling to expand such infrastructure to contain the spread of coronavirus.

"We can make it available to any agency or any state government on demand," OFB Chairman Hari Mohan said.

The isolation tents were developed within four or five days of research, he said.

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The two-bedded tents with medical equipment can be used for screening, isolation and quarantine, its spokesman Uddipon Mukherjee said.

These tents with a floor area of 9.55 square metre are made up of waterproof fabric, mild steel and aluminium alloy, he said.

The tents can be set up in any place and terrain and help in creating additional facilities, other than those in conventional hospitals, within a short period of time.

The city-headquartered OFB has also been making sanitiser, masks and disposal bed linen sheet at its various facilities across the country, including those at explosives and armaments factories.

OFB chairman Mohan said that the main job of ordnance factories is to provide arms and ammunition to the country's soldiers.

Read: Coronavirus India update: State-wise total number of confirmed cases, deaths

"But the country is going through a different crisis now; medical professionals, including doctors, nurses, paramedics, apart from police personnel are fighting it and they are the soldiers now," he said.

Mohan said the OFB has chipped in to support these soldiers in any possible way it can and for the last fortnight, its factories are manufacturing masks, sanitiser and bodysuits.

The Indian Ordnance Factories organisation a family of 41 ordnance factories under the aegis of its corporate headquarters Ordnance Factory Board, Kolkata has over 200 years of experience in defence production.

Indian Ordnance Factories is the oldest and largest industrial setup which functions under the Department of Defence Production of the Ministry of Defence.