Tech billionaires including Tim Cook, Elon Musk, and Mark Zuckerberg promise 18 million masks to fight COVID-19

The coronavirus pandemic has created a surge in demand for respirator masks globally which in turn has created an immense shortage.

Tech giants have come forward to provide millions of masks to healthcare workers working on the forefront to  fight against coronavirus.

Tim Cook, CEO Apple pledged to announce that Apple will be donating "millions" of masks to health workers in the US and Europe.

Our teams at Apple have been working to help source supplies for healthcare providers fighting COVID-19. We’re donating millions of masks for health professionals in the US and Europe. To every one of the heroes on the front lines, we thank you.

Mark Zuckerberg came forward and announced that Facebook will be donating leftover masks from the California wildfires while it works on sourcing "millions more."

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"The situation is ever-changing and we all need to be flexible. Our commitment to our community will only get stronger. We are actively looking for new ways to make a difference and we'll keep you posted," said a Facebook spokesperson.

Elon Musk said Tesla and SpaceX have 250,000 N95 masks ready to start sending out. "Aiming to start distributing those to hospitals tomorrow night," Musk added in the email to CleanTechnica.

 

We’ll try to get & deliver as many as possible. N95 masks are a pain to wear btw. Less onerous masks are better most of the time.

On Sunday a researcher at the University of Washington Medical Center (UWMC) also received 50,000 masks from Elon Musk, reports The Seattle Times.

Musk has also promised that Tesla and SpaceX will dedicate resources to manufacturing ventilators for hospitals, "should have over 1000 ventilators by next week," Musk told CleanTechnica.

Marc Benioff, CEO Salesforce tweeted that the company had already donated 9,000 masks to the University of California Medical Center, and is working on distributing a total of 5 million masks this week plus extra protective equipment.

 

Jack Ma, Chinese tech billionaire also joined the bandwagon and has so far promised masks to 90 countries.

Jack Ma, Chinese tech billionaire also joined the bandwagon and has so far promised masks to 90 countries.

Ma, will be shipping 100,000 masks to every single African country (meaning a total of 5.4 million) with 1.8 million masks would be distributed among Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Laos, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.

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Satya Nadella, CEO Microsoft highlighted the ways his company is partnering with medical and research organisations to provide software tools in the COVID-19 fight.

The company's president Brad Smith tweeted about providing medical supplies to healthcare workers.

As businesses mobilize, our global supply chain team is hard at work securing much-needed supplies for healthcare workers. On Fri, the first 5 pallets of PPE arrived, including:
- 15,000 protection goggles
- Infrared thermometers
- Medical caps

This article originally published on Business Insider.