LAKELAND, Fla. — The first of the federal government's free N95 masks began arriving at some U.S. pharmacies this past week. Some may be from right here in the Tampa Bay area.
ACI in Lakeland is answering the federal government's call for help, making millions of surgical respirators a day.
"We're running pretty hard right now," Matt Mueller, President of ACI, said.
His staff continues making sacrifices for safety, working around the clock to answer a dire need nationwide.
"We're not a company that just started doing this. We started making the N95's about a year and a half ago," Mueller said.
The facility got a call from Lakeland Regional Health asking if they could help with the PPE shortage at the beginning of the pandemic. That's when they started manufacturing shields and created their own version of an N95 respirator.
Now, a unique machine they've built from scratch is the only one in the country pumping out nearly two million surgical N95 respirators a day.
"Our N95 respirator is not only NIOSH approved, which is a part of the CDC, but ours is also FDA cleared. So it's an additional step. It's the highest level of an anti-fibrous mask you can possibly get," Mueller said.
As the omicron and delta variants circulate the U.S., production continues to ramp up, with the CDC recommending everyone wear a KN95 or N95 mask to avoid getting infected.
"I'd say over the past, you know, several weeks, it's really spiked up. Now N95's are the gold standard," Mueller said.
Each batch is tested for its quality to make sure it's safe. As long as the need is there, ACI's machine will keep running.
"We want to manufacture and provide to the healthcare workers, first responders, essential workers, the government, whether it be on the state or federal level, " Mueller said. "By all means, you want to do our part and our capacity lends us to be one of the major players. Plus we're a manufacturer right here domestically in Lakeland, Florida."