Protective Clothing and Gear

Subterms

    Latest story

    138 Shares79 Views

    Tariffs on China Aren’t Likely to Rescue Battered U.S. P.P.E. Industry

    by

    The few domestic companies that still make protective gear for health care workers have clamored for federal intervention. But they worry President Trump’s trade war with China won’t help.Few domestic industries have been as devastated by the flood of cheap Chinese imports as manufacturers of face masks, exam gloves and other disposable medical gear that protects health care workers from infectious pathogens.The industry’s demise had calamitous consequences during the Covid pandemic, when Beijing halted exports and American hospital workers found themselves at the mercy of a deadly airborne virus that quickly filled the nation’s emergency rooms and morgues.But as President Trump unveiled his tariff regimen earlier this month, and Beijing retaliated with an 84 percent tax on American imports, the few remaining companies that make protective gear in the United States felt mostly unease.“I’m pretty freaked out,” said Lloyd Armbrust, the chief executive of Armbrust American, a pandemic-era startup that produces N95 respirator masks at a factory in Texas. “On one hand, this is the kind of medicine we need if we really are going to become independent of China. On the other hand, this is not responsible industrial policy.”The United States once dominated the field of personal protective equipment, or P.P.E. The virus-filtering N95 mask and the disposable nitrile glove are American inventions, but China now produces more than 90 percent of the medical gear worn by American health care workers.Despite bipartisan vows to end the nation’s dependency on foreign medical products — and to shore up the dozens of domestic manufacturers that sprung up during the pandemic — federal agencies and state governments have resumed their reliance on inexpensive Chinese imports. Earlier this year, when California purchased millions of N95 masks for those affected by the Los Angeles wildfires, it chose masks made in China.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    More stories

    • 113 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      SpaceX Polaris Dawn Spacewalk: How to Watch the Astronauts

      by

      The astronauts of the Polaris Dawn mission, after traveling through heavy radiation and high orbits, are getting ready to open the hatch of their SpaceX vehicle.Early Thursday morning, four private astronauts circling far above Earth will try something daring — let all the air out of their spacecraft.That will be a prelude for two of the astronauts, who will then venture outside for the first commercial spacewalk ever, an event that is to be the highlight of the Polaris Dawn mission led by Jared Isaacman, a billionaire entrepreneur.When is the spacewalk and how can I watch it?The spacewalk is scheduled to begin at 2:23 a.m. Eastern time. SpaceX plans to broadcast live coverage starting one hour before the spacewalk begins.If needed, a backup opportunity is available on Friday at the same time.What will happen during the spacewalk?Because there is no airlock in the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft used for the flight, the only way to perform a spacewalk is to let all the air out of the spacecraft, and then open one of the hatches. That requires all four crew members to wear spacesuits.NASA and Soviet astronauts conducted spacewalks in a similar manner in the 1960s.As the Crew Dragon swings around Earth in an elliptical orbit that swings as close as 120 miles to the surface and as high as 460 miles, Mr. Isaacman and Sarah Gillis, a SpaceX engineer, will exit the capsule for about 15 to 20 minutes each.They will pass through the hatch at the top of the Crew Dragon with the help of a handrail that SpaceX has named Skywalker, moving around carefully and deliberately. The two will not be outside the spacecraft at the same time.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 188 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Man Is First to Be Charged in New York With Wearing a Mask in Public

      by

      Wesslin Omar Ramirez Castillo was frisked and charged with knife possession after the police stopped him for wearing a ski mask.A man on Long Island has been arrested and charged with possessing a knife and wearing a face mask in public, a milestone moment in the debate over whether to criminalize masks in New York State.The push to ban masks in some public settings began in June after some pro-Palestinian demonstrators covered their faces during protests. They said that they had done so to avoid online harassment, though some activists used the anonymity provided by their masks to harass people or to engage in acts of vandalism.The man arrested on Sunday, Wesslin Omar Ramirez Castillo, 18, the first to face charges under a mask ban passed this month in Nassau County, N.Y., was not engaged in protest. He was walking down Spindle Road, a residential street of tidy lawns and single-family homes in Hicksville, wearing dark clothes and a ski mask in August, the county police said in a statement.Christopher Boyle, a spokesman for the Nassau County executive, Bruce Blakeman, a Republican who championed the anti-mask law, said Mr. Castillo “was on the street corner, and somebody called in a suspicious person.”When police officers arrived, they frisked Mr. Castillo and discovered a 14-inch knife in the waistband of his pants, the department said in a statement on Tuesday. He was charged on Monday with several crimes, including criminal possession of a weapon and a violation of the mask law.“Our police officers were able to use the mask ban legislation as well as other factors to stop and interrogate an individual who was carrying a weapon with the intent to engage in a robbery,” Mr. Blakeman said in a statement. “Passing this law gave police another tool to stop this dangerous criminal.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More