As Dyson and his cosy relationship with Johnson are back in the news, worth recalling that neither his nor any other ‘Heath Robinson’ ventilator scheme delivered any ventilators at all. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/dyson-will-not-supply-ventilators-to-nhs-to-treat-covid-19?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

The NHS managed with repurposed ventilators from operating theatres and NIV devices. By wave 2 we had a large number of imported vents - they worked but were the poor relations of proper ICU ventilators.

Behind this was a failure to maintain the national ventilator stockpile in the years running up to the pandemic, despite a pandemic being high on the risk register (I.e. we knew a pandemic was likely, just not when it would come or the precise virus)

Anyone after a brief introduction to ventilators for COVID
https://twitter.com/andymoz78/status/1260628710962716673?s=21 https://twitter.com/andymoz78/status/1260628710962716673