Cape Town - Moroccan engineers have said they will convert Decathlon snorkelling masks into respirators to assist those infected by the novel coronavirus, reports online news publication the North Africa Post.
A group of engineers made the announcement via a Facebook post on Wednesday.
Since the outbreak of Covid-19, Morocco has ordered 550 ventilators to be distributed as part of a package of $200 million (about R3.7 billion) to acquire other equipment and medicine to treat patients with the disease.
According to the North Africa Post, the engineers said that the multinational sports equipment chain Decathlon backs the idea, has kept its stockpile of such masks and plans to donate them to authorities, should they endorse the plan.
Meanwhile, student engineers at a Czech technical university say they have converted standard snorkelling masks into life-saving apparatus.
They say the masks act as improvised yet personal protective equipment, according to the Facebook page Now This.
The full-face snorkel masks have been retrofitted with military-grade filters by a research team at the Czech university.
The idea has also been adopted by other nations, who are adding their own specific medical parts to provide critical airflow to stop patients' lungs from collapsing, reports North Africa News.