University donates safety equipment to NHS Trusts

The University of Brighton has donated face visors, half face respirators, safety glasses, disposable gloves, aprons, hand sanitizer to healthcare providers throughout Sussex.

Dr James Ebdon, Head of the university’s Environment and Public Health Research and Enterprise Group, said: “This was the result of an urgent request, and we didn’t hesitate to respond. This is a national emergency and it is important that we do what we can to help – wherever and however possible.”

Scientists and staff in the university’s School of Environment and Technology (SET) and the Schools of Pharmacy and Biomolecular Science (PABS), joined forces to draw up an inventory of key supplies prior to the period of lockdown and so were swift to respond when the requests started arriving.

Dr Ebdon said: “Getting this equipment dispatched to three separate local NHS Trusts was a collective effort by our technical staff including Magda Grove, Pete Lyons, Jack Barker (from SET) and Cinzia Dedi, Bertie Berterelli, Joe Hawthorne (from PABS) and Kirsty Smallbone (Head of the Schools of Environment and Technology and Pharmacy and Biomolecular Science).

Kirsty said: “This was a great effort and I want to thank everyone concerned. We want to help the NHS as much as we can.”