Global material science company Milliken & Company (Spartanburg, South Carolina, USA) recently announced that it has leveraged its unique capabilities to help produce needed medical personal protective equipment (PPE) amid the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Due to current shortages in the plastic materials used to make protective face shields, plastic manufacturers are relying on the more readily available polypropylene plastic. However, because this material is naturally hazy, manufacturers are turning to Milliken’s NX UltraClear polypropylene concentrate to produce plastics with clarity levels suitable for healthcare industry face shields.

“In this global pandemic, the need for medical PPE continues to rise,” says Halsey M. Cook, president and chief operating officer for Milliken. “We are committed to finding solutions that assist our customers and allow us to join the fight against COVID-19 wherever we can make a difference.”

In evaluating the use of NX UltraClear for medical PPE production, Milliken collaborated with a variety of global and regional plastic manufacturers. Among the companies that use Milliken concentrates to manufacture polypropylene sheet face shields include Impact Plastics (Putnam, Connecticut, USA) and Mezger (Nuremberg, Germany).

Source: Milliken & Company, www.milliken.com.